Olagues v. Perceptive Advisors LLC

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Plaintiffs filed a derivative action under Section 16(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 against Perceptive, seeking to require the company to disgorge profits from writing call options on shares of Repros that later expired. The Second Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of Perceptive's motion to dismiss the complaint, holding that, under the plain text of 17 C.F.R. 240.16b6(d) and the congressional purpose of Section 16(b), the statement that liability attaches "upon the cancellation or expiration of [the] option" to mean that there could be liability only if Perceptive owned more than 10 percent of Repros shares at the moment when the calls actually expired. In this case, because the puts were exercised—resulting in Perceptive's sale of most of its Repros shares—prior to the expiration of the calls, the expiration of the calls did not trigger liability. View "Olagues v. Perceptive Advisors LLC" on Justia Law