Justia Securities Law Opinion Summaries

MCL 450.4515(1)(e) provided alternative statutes of limitations: one based on the time of discovery of the cause of action and the other based on the time of accrual of the cause of action. Plaintiffs were former employees of defendant ePrize who acquired ownership units in the company. Plaintiffs alleged founder Jeff Linkner orally promised them that their interests in ePrize would never be diluted or subordinated. In its fifth operating agreement, executed in 2009, ePrize stock issued in Series C and Series B Units carried distribution priority over the common units held by plaintiffs. The Operating Agreement further provided that if the company were ever sold, Series C Units would receive the first $68.25 million of any available distribution. In 2012, ePrize sold substantially all of its assets and, pursuant to the Operating Agreement, distributed nearly $100 million in net proceeds to the holders of Series C and Series B Units. Plaintiffs received nothing for their common shares. Plaintiffs thereafter sued, bringing claims for LLC member oppression, breach of contract, and breach of fiduciary duty. The trial court granted defendants’ motion for summary judgment, concluding that the three-year limitation period in MCL 450.4515(1)(e) constituted a statute of limitations, rather than a statute of repose, and that plaintiffs' claims accrued in 2009. The Court of Appeals disagreed, finding plaintiffs’ claims did not accrue until 2012, when ePrize sold substantially all of its assets, because until that sale plaintiffs had not incurred a calculable financial injury and any damage claim before that time would have been “speculative.” Accordingly, the Court concluded that plaintiffs’ claims were timely filed before the expiration of the three-year limitation period. The Michigan Supreme Court agreed with the trial court's reasoning: plaintiffs’ actions for damages under MCL 450.4515(1)(e) were barred by the three-year statute of limitations unless plaintiffs could establish on remand that they were entitled to tolling. View "Frank v. Linkner" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs, shareholders of ATP, filed a securities class action concerning ATP's collapse into bankruptcy. Plaintiffs alleged that defendants, each of whom was an officer or director of ATP, misrepresented the production of Well 941 #4, ATP's liquidity and whether the company had the available funds to complete the Clipper pipeline, and the true reason that Matt McCarroll resigned as CEO of ATP. The district court dismissed plaintiffs' Second Amended Complaint with prejudice. The court concluded that, viewing plaintiffs' allegations as a whole, plaintiffs failed adequately to allege scienter with regard to Defendant Reese's statements; plaintiffs' allegations of scienter as to ATP's liquidity and the Clipper project failed as a matter of law; and there was no basis for the court to conclude that Defendants Bulmahn and Reese knew or were reckless in not knowing McCarroll's true reasons for resigning. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "Neiman v. Bulmahn" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs Peter Brinckerhoff and his trust, were long-term investors in Enbridge Energy Partners, L.P. (“EEP”), a Delaware master limited partnership (“MLP”). A benefit under Delaware law of this business structure was the ability to eliminate common law duties in favor of contractual ones, thereby restricting disputes to the four corners of the limited partnership agreement (“LPA”). This was not the first lawsuit between Brinckerhoff and the Enbridge MLP entities over a conflicted transaction. In 2009, Brinckerhoff filed suit against most of the same defendants in the current dispute, and challenged a transaction between the sponsor and the limited partnership. Enbridge, Inc. (“Enbridge”), the ultimate parent entity that controlled EEP’s general partner, Enbridge Energy Company, Inc. (“EEP GP”), proposed a joint venture agreement (“JVA”) between EEP and Enbridge. Brinckerhoff contested the fairness of the transaction on a number of grounds. After several rounds in the Court of Chancery leading to the dismissal of his claims, and a trip to the Delaware Supreme Court, Brinckerhoff eventually came up short when the Court of Chancery’s ruling that he had waived his claims for reformation and rescission of the transaction by failing to assert them first in the Court of Chancery was affirmed. A dispute over the Clipper project would again go before the Court of Chancery. In 2014, Enbridge proposed that EEP repurchase Enbridge’s interest in the Alberta Clipper project excluding the expansion rights that were part of the earlier transaction. As part of the billion dollar transaction, EEP would issue to Enbridge a new class of EEP partnership securities, repay outstanding loans made by EEP GP to EEP, and, amend the LPA to effect a “Special Tax Allocation” whereby the public investors would be allocated items of gross income that would otherwise be allocated to EEP GP. According to Brinckerhoff, the Special Tax Allocation unfairly benefited Enbridge by reducing its tax obligations by hundreds of millions of dollars while increasing the taxes of the public investors, thereby undermining the investor’s long-term tax advantages in their MLP investment. The Court of Chancery did its best to reconcile earlier decisions interpreting the same or a similar LPA, and ended up dismissing the complaint. On appeal, Brinckerhoff challenged the reasonableness of the Court of Chancery’s interpretation of the LPA. The Supreme Court agreed with the defendants that the Special Tax Allocation did not breach Sections 5.2(c) and 15.3(b) governing new unit issuance and tax allocations. But, the Court found that the Court of Chancery erred when it held that other “good faith” provisions of the LPA “modified” Section 6.6(e)’s specific requirement that the Alberta Clipper transaction be “fair and reasonable to the Partnership.” View "Brinckerhoff v. Enbridge Energy Company, Inc., et al." on Justia Law

Noteholders succeeded in securing warrants that the issuer of the notes had promised as a result of the resolution of a previous event of default. When addressing the merits, the Court of Chancery held that the promise of warrants had become a right of the noteholders under the notes, as amended after the default. On that ground, the Court of Chancery awarded the noteholders the warrants they sought. The noteholders then sought to recover their attorneys’ fees based on a fee-shifting provision in the notes which entitled the noteholders to attorneys’ fees if: (1)”any indebtedness” evidenced by the notes was collected in a court proceeding; or (2) the notes were placed in the hands of attorneys for collection after default. But, the Court of Chancery denied this request and the noteholders appealed. After review, the Delaware Supreme Court found that because the warrants were a form of indebtedness that the noteholders had to collect through an action in the Court of Chancery, the noteholders were entitled to attorneys’ fees. The noteholders were also entitled to attorneys’ fees because they had to seek the assistance of counsel to collect the warrants after default. View "Washington v. Preferred Communication Systems, Inc." on Justia Law

The complaint and referenced documents show that Quiznos fast-food franchise had borrowed heavily before its business sharply declined. From 2007 to 2011, Quiznos lost roughly 3,000 franchise restaurants and profitability plunged. With this plunge, Quiznos could no longer satisfy its loan covenants. As a result, Avenue Capital Management II, L.P., “Fortress” (a collective of investment entities) and others could foreclose on collateral, call in debt, or accelerate payments. To avoid a calamity, Quiznos restructured its debt. This securities-fraud matter arose out of the attempt to restructure that debt. Multiple investment funds purchased equity in Quiznos, and despite efforts, Avenue and Fortress sued former Quiznos managers and officers, claiming they had fraudulently misrepresented Quiznos’ financial condition. The district court dismissed the causes of action based on securities fraud based on a failure to state a valid claim. Finding no reversible error in that dismissal, the Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court’s decision. View "Avenue Capital Management II, v. Schaden" on Justia Law

Tutor Perini Corporation, a giant construction company, sued Banc of America Securities LLC (BAS) and Bank of America, N.A. (BANA), alleging that BAS, acting as its broker-dealer and with BANA’s knowledge and acquiescence, sold Tutor Perini auction-rate securities (ARS) without disclosing that the ARS market was heading for a crash. Tutor Perini filed suit in Massachusetts’s federal district court, alleging securities fraud under state and federal law and several other state-law claims. BAS and BANA moved for summary judgment on all claims, claiming that BAS actually disclosed the risks that later materialized. The district court granted BAS and BANA’s motion. The First Circuit (1) vacated the summary judgment for BAS on the state securities-fraud claim, the federal securities-fraud claim, the state negligent-misrepresentation claim, and the state unfair-business-practices claim, holding that genuine issues of material fact existed as to these claims; and (2) affirmed in all other respects. Remanded. View "Tutor Perini Corp. v. Banc of America Securities LLC" on Justia Law

Witter contends that in August 2007 he telephoned Skelton, an employee of his broker, TransAct, with instructions to cancel several standing orders. Skelton did not do so, and Witter lost $23,000 on the resulting market position. Skelton claims that Witter never told him to cancel all seven of the working orders at issue. Witter filed a complaint with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, 7 U.S.C. 18(a), which found no violation. The judgment officer refused to draw an adverse inference based on TransAct’s failure to produce a recording of the “one crucial conversation” because TransAct was not required to record the call; he found that Skelton’s version was more plausible and Witter had a “propensity to confuse trading terms” like “position” and “order.” The Seventh Circuit affirmed, finding the Commission’s decision was supported by the evidence. Federal regulations require that, before buying or selling a commodity, a merchant must receive either “specific authorization” or “authorization in writing,” 17 C.F.R. 166.2. No regulation requires the merchant to record phone calls to cancel previously authorized orders to buy or sell. View "Witter v. Commodity Futures Trading Comm'n" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs, shareholders of ZAGG Inc., a publicly held Nevada corporation, filed a shareholder-derivative action seeking damages, restitution, and other relief for ZAGG. They alleged that past and present officers and directors of ZAGG violated section 14(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, breached their fiduciary duties to ZAGG, wasted corporate assets, and were unjustly enriched. The district court dismissed the suit on two alternative grounds: (1) Plaintiffs filed suit before presenting the ZAGG Board of Directors (the Board) with a demand to bring suit and they failed to adequately allege that such demand would have been futile; and (2) the complaint failed to state a claim. Plaintiffs appealed the dismissal on both of the district court's alternative grounds. Because the Tenth Circuit denied the challenge to the first ground, it did not address the second. View "Pikk v. Pedersen" on Justia Law

The plaintiffs were all affiliates of Arthur and Angela Williams, who owned stock in Citigroup. The defendants were Citigroup and eight of its officers and directors. In 1998, Citicorp and Travelers Group, Inc. merged, forming Citigroup. At that point, Arthur Williams's shares in Travelers Group were converted into 17.6 million shares of Citigroup common stock, which were valued at the time of the merger at $35 per share. In 2007, the Williamses had these shares transferred into AHW Investment Partnership, MFS Inc., and seven grantor-retained annuity trusts, all of which the Williamses controlled. In 2007, the Williamses sold one million shares at $55 per share. But, the Williamses halted their plan to sell all of their Citigroup stock because, based on Citigroup's filings and financial statements, they concluded that there was little downside to retaining their remaining 16.6 million shares. The Williamses allegedly held those shares for the next twenty-two months, finally selling them in March 2009 for $3.09 per share. After selling their 16.6 million shares, the Williamses sued Citigroup in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, arguing that their decision not to sell all of their shares in May 2007, and their similar decisions to hold on at least three later dates, were due to Citigroup‘s failure to disclose accurate information about its true financial condition from 2007 to 2009. The Second Circuit certified a question of Delaware law to the Delaware Supreme Court arising from an appeal of a New York District Court decision. The Second Circuit asked whether the claims of a plaintiff against a corporate defendant alleging damages based on the plaintiff‘s continuing to hold the corporation's stock in reliance on the defendant's misstatements as the stock diminished in value properly brought as direct or derivative claims. The Delaware Court answered: the holder claims in this action were direct. "This is because under the laws governing those claims [(]those of either New York or Florida[)] the claims belong to the stockholder who allegedly relied on the corporation's misstatements to her detriment. Under those state laws, the holder claims are not derivative because they are personal to the stockholder and do not belong to the corporation itself." View "Citigroup Inc., et al. v. AHW Investment Partnership, MFS, Inc., et al." on Justia Law

The Golf Channel, Inc. entered into an agreement with Stanford International Bank Limited (Stanford) under which Golf Channel received $5.9 million in exchange for media-advertising services. It was later discovered that Stanford used a classic Ponzi-scheme artifice. At issue in this case was whether Golf Channel must return all remuneration paid for services rendered absent proof the transaction benefited Stanford’s creditors. The Fifth Circuit initially ordered Golf Channel to relinquish its compensation, concluding that media-advertising services have “no value” to a Ponzi scheme’s creditors despite the same services being potentially “quite valuable” to the creditors of a legitimate business. On rehearing, the Circuit vacated its opinion and certified a question to the Supreme Court regarding the Texas Uniform Fraudulent Transfer Act (TUFTA), under which an asset transferred with intent to defraud a creditor may be reclaimed for the benefit of the transferor’s creditors unless the transferee took the asset in good faith and for “reasonably equivalent value.” The Supreme Court held that TUFTA does not contain separate standards for assessing “value” and “reasonably equivalent value” based on whether the debtor was operating a Ponzi scheme and that value must be determined objectively at the time of the transfer and in relation to the individual exchange at hand. View "Janvey v. Golf Channel, Inc." on Justia Law