On October 1, 2014, new statutory provisions went into effect in France allowing consumers the means to seek and obtain relief on a class–wide basis. Though these provisions have been in force for over two years now, the use of the class action mechanism has not really caught on. Because the class action procedures have not yet been widely taken up, there have already been at least two revisions of the original provisions adopted that expanded the scope of the original class action model, and further revisions seem likely. In a November 17, 2016 memo entitled “The Implications of the Expanded Scope of the French Class Action System on Potential Liability and Insurance Coverage for Companies Domiciled in and Doing Business in France” (here), Kevin Dreher and Laura Ferry of the Reed Smith law firm take a look at the modified French class action mechanism and examine the mechanism’s implications for companies doing business in France.
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The Rise of Collective Shareholder Actions in Europe
In numerous recent posts, I have noted the global rise of investor collective actions (refer for example here). These lawsuits, which take a variety of different forms according to the applicable forum laws, have been filed in a number of different countries. Among other regions that have seen a recent rise in this type of litigation is Europe. In an interesting November 16, 2016 publication entitled “Rise of European Shareholder Class Action? (here), AIG Europe takes a look at the recent rise of collective investor actions, noting among other things that these types of actions are “on the rise in Europe” as a result of “a number of converging factors.”
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Wave of ADA Website Accessibility Lawsuits Grows, Community Bankers Threatened
In a prior post, I noted concerns over lawsuits filed under the American Disabilities Act (ADA) relating to website accessibility. I noted at the time that a court holding that a website violated the ADA’s public accommodation accessibility requirement likely would lead to an increase in litigation involving website accessibility. As I suspected might happen, this increase has now materialized. Indeed, according to a September 29, 2016 post on the ADA Title III News and Insights blog (here), website accessibility lawsuits “have become big business” for a number of plaintiffs’ law firms.
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Guest Post: Litigation Finance: Stop The Hide-And-Seek Game
Litigation Funding is an increasingly important part of the current litigation scene, but it remains controversial. One of the important issues under debate is the question of whether or not litigation funding arrangements must be disclosed. In a recent discovery-related ruling (here), Northern District of California Judge Susan Illston confronted this question of whether or not a class action plaintiff must disclose third-party litigation funding contracts. As discussed below in the following guest post from Lisa Rickard, the President of U.S. Chamber Institute for Legal Reform, takes a look at Judge Illston’s decisions and examines its relevance in the ongoing debate regarding litigation funding. I would like to thank Lisa for her willingness to publish her article as a guest post on my site. I welcome guest post submissions from responsible authors on topics of interest to this site’s readers. Please contact me directly if you would like to submit and article. Here is Lisa’s guest post.
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Justice Scalia’s Business Law Legacy
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s death on Saturday has already triggered concerns about the possible outcome of the numerous important cases now pending before the Court, and has further agitated an already tumultuous Presidential election campaign. The furious debate that is already well underway about the nomination of Justice Scalia’s successor could be one of the key issues in the current campaign, and perhaps beyond. While these controversies are likely to continue and to dominate the headlines for some time to come, a different process will also be taking place, and also will likely continue for some time – that is, the debate over Justice Scalia’s legacy.
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There’s a Reason You Are Suddenly Hearing About the TCPA Everywhere You Go
On the panel in which I participated during last week’s PLUS D&O Symposium, one of the important topics we discussed was the question of coverage under a D&O insurance policy for claims under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, a topic about which I have previously written on this blog. That a once-obscure statute like the TCPA has become an important topic of conversation is no accident. The fact is that the number of TCPA actions filed has absolutely exploded, as detailed in a recent study published by the Institute for Legal Reform, an affiliate of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
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Spanish Class Action is the Latest Collective Investor Action Filed Outside U.S.
The filing of securities class action lawsuits is, of course, well-established in the United States, and in recent years has become a regular phenomenon in Australia and Canada as well. In the wake of various recent scandals, numerous group or mass investor actions, if not full-blown class actions, have been filed or will be filed in a number of other countries, including the U.K. (for example, in connection with the Tesco accounting scandal), Germany (in connection with the VW emissions scandal), Japan (in connection with the Toshiba scandal), Italy (in connection with the Saipem scandal), and possibly Brazil (in connection with various companies’ involvement in the Petrobras scandal).
Now it appears that investors in the troubled Spanish banking company Bankia have initiated a class action lawsuit against the company. According to news reports (here), counsel for 660 individual investors has filed an action in a Madrid court seeking to have the individuals compensated for their investment losses in connection with the company’s 2011 stock flotation. The investors collectively seek recovery of 6.3 million euros (about $7 million).
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Class Action Litigation, Professor Coffee, and Judge Rakoff
One of the legal issues that attracts continuous vigorous debate is the question of whether or not class actions in general, and securities class actions in particular, produce a social benefit sufficient to justify their sometimes enormous costs. This question receives an interesting and readable analysis in an article in the November 19, 2015 issue of The New York Review of Books entitled “The Cure for Corporate Wrongdoing: Class Actions vs. Individual Prosecutions” (here) in which Southern District of New York Judge Jed Rakoff reviews Columbia Law Professor John Coffee’s new book, Entrepreneurial Litigation: Its Rise, Fall, and Future (here). While Judge Rakoff provides his (quite positive) assessment of Professor Coffee’s book, he also delivers his own analysis of the issues Professor Coffee raises, as well as of the prescriptions Professor Coffee proposes for the class action defects he has identified, as discussed below.
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New Supreme Court Case Could Have Huge Impact on Class Action Litigation
On April 27, 2015, in a development that could have significant implications for a wide variety of class action lawsuits, the United States Supreme Court granted the petition of for a writ of certiorari of online search firm Spokeo. The cert grant sets the stage for the Court
Class Action Litigation in Latin America: Where We Are Now, Where We Could Be Headed
Among the features of the U.S. legal system that foreign observers often single out for concern is the availability of class action litigation procedures. The fact is, however, that many countries around the world have adopted some form of class action procedure, at least for consumer-oriented litigation. According to a recent report, Latin America is