U.S. Supreme Court

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The current Supreme Court term promised to be an interesting one from a securities law standpoint, as the Court had agreed to take up two cases dealing with key securities class action litigation issues. One of those cases is the securities case involving the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica’s user data scandal. The Facebook case would have required the Court to address an important and recurring disclosure related issue. However, on November 22, 2024, the Court issued a single-line order stating that “the writ of certiorari is dismissed as improvidently granted,” meaning that the Supreme Court’s consideration of the Facebook case will now not go forward, and the Ninth Circuit’s ruling in the case, in which the appellate court reversed in part the district court’s dismissal of the case, will now stand. A copy of the Supreme Court’s November 22, 2024, order can be found here.Continue Reading U.S. Supreme Court Dismisses Facebook Case, Saying Writ Improvidently Granted

Daniel Aronowitz

On June 28, 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, in which the court overruled the so-called Chevron doctrine, pursuant to which courts had deferred to agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes. In the following guest post, Daniel Aronowitz, President of Encore [formerly Euclid] Fiduciary, provides his views of the Court’s decision in the Loper Bright Enterprises case and discusses its implications. A version of this article previously was published on Encore Fiduciary’s Fid Guru blog. I would like to thank Dan for allowing me to publish his article as a guest post on this 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 a guest post. Here is Dan’s article.Continue Reading Guest Post: The Overreaction to the End of Chevron Deference

Lawrence Fine

As discussed here, in its April 2024 decision in Macquarie Infrastructure Corp. v. Moab Partners, the U.S. Supreme Court held that a failure to disclose information required by Item 303 of Regulation S-K cannot support a private claim under Rule 10b-5 in the absence of an otherwise-misleading statement. The upshot is that so-called “pure omissions” cases are not actionable, meaning that omissions are only actionable if they make an affirmative statement materially misleading. In the following guest post, Larry Fine, Management Liability Coverage Leader for WTW, takes a closer look at the Macquarie decision and considers its implications, particularly with respect to future cases based on alleged omissions. A version of this article was previously published as a WTW client alert. I would like to thank Larry for allowing me to publish this article as a guest post on this 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 a guest post. Here is Larry’s article.Continue Reading Guest Post: The Additional Pro-Defense Benefits of the Macquarie Decision

Sarah Abrams

As I noted in a post at the time (here), last Thursday, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in SEC v. Jarkesy, striking down the SEC’s use of in-house courts in enforcement actions seeking monetary penalties. Then on Friday, the Court issued its decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, in which the court wiped out the so-called Chevron doctrine, in which courts deferred to agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes. In the following guest post, Sarah Abrams, Head of Claims, Baleen Specialty, a division of Bowhead Specialty Underwriters, takes a look at these two decisions and examines some of the decisions’ implications from a D&O insurance perspective. I would like to thank Sarah for allowing me to publish her article as a guest post on this 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 a guest post. Here is Sarah’s article.Continue Reading Guest Post: Regulatory Coverage Impact on D&O Insurers Post-US Supreme Court Decisions in Jarkesy and Loper

Just days after the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to take up the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica securities case concerning risk factor disclosures (as discussed here), the Court has now agreed to take up yet another securities case, this time in a case involving Nvidia and involving the standards for pleading scienter and falsity under the PSLRA. The NVIDIA case involves alleged fraud in connection with the company’s disclosures concerning its sales of graphics processing units (GPU) to cryptocurrency companies as a component of its overall GPU sales. The specific questions the case presents to the Supreme Court concern what and how a plaintiff must plead when pleading scienter and falsity. Because the case involves the PSLRA’s “exacting pleading requirements,” the case potentially could prove to be very significant. A copy of the Court’s June 17, 2024 Order granting the petition for writ of certiorari can be found here.Continue Reading Supreme Court Agrees to Take Up Nvidia Securities Suit On Pleading Standards Issues

Sarah Eichenberger
Jonathan Rotenberg

As I noted in a post at the time, last Fall, the U.S. Supreme Court in the Macquarie Infrastructure Corporation v. Moab Partners, L.P. case agreed to take up the question of whether whether the failure to make disclosure required by Item 303 of Reg. S-K is an actionable omission under Section 10(b) and Rule 10b-5. In January, the Court heard oral argument in the case. In the following guest post, Sarah Eichenberger and Jonathan Rotenberg, Partners in the Securities Litigation practice at the Katten law firm, discuss the questions the Justices as asked the oral argument and assess the possible outcomes of the case, as well as the potential significance of the outcomes. I would like to thank Sarah and Jonathan for allowing me to publish their article as a guest post on this 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 a guest post. Here is Sarah and Jonathan’s article.Continue Reading Guest Post: Supreme Court Considers Whether Pure Omissions Can Support Section 10(b) Liability

The U.S. Supreme Court – in a short, concise, unanimous opinion – has ruled that to assert Section 11 claims against Slack in connection with the company’s June 2019 direct listing, the plaintiff must plead and prove that he purchased shares pursuant to Slack’s allegedly misleading registration statement. Slack had offered both registered and unregistered shares in the direct listing. Even though the plaintiff had not alleged that the shares he purchased were registered shares, the Ninth Circuit had allowed the plaintiff’s claims to stand. The Supreme Court vacated the Ninth Circuit’s order and remanded the case to the district court. At a minimum, the Supreme Court’s ruling means Section 11 plaintiffs must plead that their shares are traceable to the offering. The practical implication of the Court’s ruling may be that the companies conducting direct listings cannot be sued under Section 11. A copy of the Court’s June 1, 2023, opinion can be found here.Continue Reading Even in Direct Listing, Section 11 Plaintiff Must Trace Shares to Registration Statement

The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to take up a case that will address the question of whether or not a claimant alleging that his employer fired him in retaliation for whistleblowing must prove that the employer acted with retaliatory intent. The court’s consideration of the case has important implications for claimants under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act’s anti-retaliation provisions, because claimants could face significantly greater difficulty in establishing their claims if they must prove that the employer acted with subjective intent to retaliate. The case could also have important implications for retaliation claims under other federal whistleblower protection laws. The Court’s May 1, 2023, order agreeing to take up the case can be found here.Continue Reading Supreme Court To Consider Whether Whistleblower Must Show Retaliatory Intent

The case pending before the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court was to consider the applicability of the PSLRA’s discovery stay in state court ’33 Act actions has been suspended by the Court at the parties’ request. The parties apparently have reached a tentative settlement of the underlying matter and jointly requested that the Court hold the matter in abeyance, pending the parties’ efforts to complete settlement documentation.
Continue Reading U.S. Supreme Court Suspends Case Addressing Discovery Stay in State Court ’33 Act Suits

In a little noticed-development last week, the U.S. Supreme Court denied the petition for a writ of certiorari in Hagan v. Khoja, in which former officials of a bankrupt pharmaceutical company sought to have the Court review a decision by the Ninth Circuit to revive a securities class action lawsuit against them. Had the petition been granted, the Court would have been called upon to consider the controversial question of whether public companies have a duty to update prior disclosures that were accurate when made. The Court’s cert denial leaves the Ninth Circuit’s ruling standing and the questions surrounding the existence and requirements of a duty to update remain unsettled. The Court’s May 20, 2019 order can be found here.  
Continue Reading Supreme Court Denies Cert Petition in Duty to Update Case