Justia Securities Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff owned a rental center and retained defendants, who provide investment banking services to the equipment rental industry, to help him obtain an investor or buyer. Defendants’ advice culminated in sale of a majority of plaintiff’s stock for about $30 million. Defendants billed plaintiff $758,675. Plaintiff paid without complaint but later sued for return of the entire fee on the ground that defendants lacked a brokerage license required by Wis. Stats. 452.01(2)(a), 452.03. The district court dismissed, finding the parties equally at fault. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, declining to definitively answer whether a license was required under the circumstances that a negotiated sale of assets fell through in favor of a sale of stock. Plaintiff is not entitled to relief even if there was a violation. Referring to the classic Highwayman’s Case, the court rejected claims of in pari delicto and unclean hands; plaintiff was not equally at fault. To bar relief, however, is not punishing a victim. Plaintiff did not incur damages and is not entitled to restitution. Plaintiff sought compensation for spotting a violation and incurring expenses to punish the violator, a bounty-hunter or private attorney general theory, not recognized under Wisconsin law. The voluntary-payment doctrine is inapplicable. View "Schlueter v. Latek" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs, groups of investors who purchased the securities of KV, brought this class action lawsuit alleging that KV and some of its individual officers committed securities fraud. Plaintiffs alleged that KV made false or misleading statements about its compliance with Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations governing the manufacture of pharmaceutical products, and made false or misleading statements about earnings resulting from pharmaceutical products allegedly manufactured in violation of FDA regulations. The court concluded plaintiffs' complaint adequately set forth the reasons why KV's statements about is compliance were false, or at least misleading, at the time they were made; the district court did not err when it determined the investors' complaint did not sufficiently plead that KV made false or misleading statements about earnings tied to the manufacture of generic Metoprolol; the district court correctly dismissed the scheme liability claims against the two individual KV officers; but the district court erred in denying the motion to amend the complaint. Accordingly the court affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded for further proceedings. View "Public Pension Fund Group, et al. v. KV Pharmaceutical Co., et al." on Justia Law

Defendants appealed from the district court's holding that defendants were liable to plaintiff in the total amount of $4,965,898.95 for profits earned in short-swing insider trading and from an order denying defendants' motion for reconsideration. At issue, inter alia, was the rarely-construed "debt exception" to liability under Section 16(b) of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934, 15 U.S.C. 78p(b), and the treatment of "hybrid" derivative securities under Section 16(b). The court agreed with the district court that the acquisition of the 2004 Note was a purchase of a security for purposes of Section 16(b), that the conversion of the 2004 Note was also a Section 16(b) purchase, and that neither of these purchases came within the debt and borderline transaction exceptions to section 16(b) liability. The court further concurred that Tonga and Cannell Capital, in addition to Cannell, were subject to disgorgement of profits, and the court concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying defendants' motion for reconsideration. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "Analytical Surveys, Inc. v. Tonga Partners, L.P., et al." on Justia Law

S&A sued Farms.com alleging that Farms.com violated the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA), 7 U.S.C. 1 et seq., breached its fiduciary duty, committed negligence, and made misrepresentations. The district court granted Farms.com's motion for summary judgment and S&A appealed. The court found that S&A did not sufficiently plead a fraudulent-inducement claim under 7 U.S.C. 6, but only alleged that Farms.com engaged in a fraudulent scheme under 7 U.S.C. 6o(1)(B). The court concluded that the district court did not err by granting Farms.com's motion for summary judgment on S&A's fraud claim where S&A's complaint alleged only a fraudulent scheme, not that Farms.com's failure to register caused it damages. The court also concluded that the district court did not err in granting Farms.com's motion for summary judgment on S&A's breach of fiduciary duty claim where S&A presented no evidence describing a commodity-trading advisor's standard of care or how Farms.com breached that standard of care. View "S & A Farms, Inc. v. Farms.com, Inc., et al." on Justia Law

The SEC brought a civil enforcement action against defendant after he orchestrated a plan to manipulate the amount of money his company was required to set aside to safeguard customer assets. Defendant was subsequently liable for committing securities fraud and on appeal, defendant challenged the district court's holding on liability and the propriety of the resulting injunction. After reviewing the record and having the benefit of oral argument, the court agreed with defendant that the facts as found by the district court did not support securities fraud liability and the court reversed the judgment on this claim. The court held, however, that it was clear from the district court's factual findings that defendant aided and abetted violations of the Securities Exchange Act, 15 U.S.C. 78a et seq., so the court affirmed the judgment finding liability on these counts. Since the court reversed the district court's finding of securities fraud, the court vacated the portion of the injunction restraining defendant from violating section 10(b) of the Exchange Act and Rule 10b-5. The court also vacated the injunction barring defendant from the securities business for life. Defendant contended that the remaining portions of the injunctions were impermissible "obey-the-law" commands and the court agreed in part, vacating these paragraphs of the injunction. View "Securities & Exchange Comm. v. Goble" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs sued on behalf of a class of similarly-situated participants and beneficiaries of the Keycorp 401(k) Savings Plan, under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, 29 U.S.C. 1109, 1132, alleging that defendants breached their duties by failing to prudently manage the Plan’s investment in KeyCorp securities; that defendants failed to adequately inform participants about the true risk of investing in KeyCorp stock; that certain defendants breached fiduciary duties by failing to adequately monitor the management and administration of Plan assets; that certain defendants failed to avoid impermissible conflicts of interest; and that certain defendants are liable for the breaches of fiduciary duty committed by their co-fiduciaries. The district court dismissed one plaintiff because she had benefited from the alleged breaches of fiduciary duty, which allowed her to sell the majority of her holdings at an inflated price. The court denied a motion to allow another to intervene as named plaintiff. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. View "Taylor v. KeyCorp" on Justia Law

Plaintiff appealed an order of the district court denying leave to amend its complaint alleging violations of section 11, 12(a)(2), and 15 of the Securities Act of 1933, 15 U.S.C. 77k, 77l(a)(2), 77o. The proposed complaint alleged that defendant was required to disclose, and failed adequately to disclose, in connection with a March 2006 secondary offering of its securities, known defects in the company's semiconductor chips. The court held that the proposed complaint stated a claim because it plausibly alleged that the defects constituted a known trend or uncertainty that the company reasonably expected would have a material unfavorable impact on revenues. Accordingly, the court vacated the judgment and remanded with instructions to permit the filing of the complaint. View "Panther Partners Inc. v. Ikanos Communications, Inc." on Justia Law

Zimmer manufactures orthopaedic reconstructive devices. One product, a replacement hip socket, was subject to a report of high failure rates. Zimmer announced preliminary findings in 2008, attributed the failures to improper surgical technique, stopped selling the product in the U.S. while preparing new instructions for implantation, and returned the item to the market. Owners of Zimmer stock sued, claiming that the problem was poor design or quality control, that Zimmer pretended otherwise to avoid hurting the price of its stock, and that Zimmer delayed revealing quality-control problems at its plant until after its 2008 quarterly report and earnings call. Zimmer had projected 10% to 11% revenue growth for the year and net earnings of $4.20 to $4.25 per share; months later it cut this projection to 8.5% to 9% growth and net earnings of $4.05 to $4.10 per share. The district court dismissed under the pleading standards of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, 15 U.S.C. 78u-4. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, holding that plaintiffs failed to establish scienter. The FDA has never concluded that the product was defectively designed or made and never issued a warning or caution; quality control issues at pharmaceutical and medical-device producers are endemic. View "Plumbers & Pipefitters Local Union 719 Pension Fund v. Zimmer Holdings Inc." on Justia Law

The SEC instituted this civil enforcement action against defendant, former CFO of a publicly-traded semiconductor company, alleging that he violated various provisions of the securities laws. Defendant subsequently appealed the district court's judgment on three grounds: (1) the district court made several evidentiary errors that required reversal; (2) the SEC's lawyers committed misconduct during the trial that required reversal; and (3) the reimbursement order pursuant to Section 304 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX 304), 15 U.S.C. 7243, violated his Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial in civil cases. The court found that, on appeal, defendant did not challenge his involvement in the scheme at issue in any way. He objected only to the procedures by which he was tried. Defendant, no less than anyone else, was of course entitled to be tried fairly. But, on reviewing the record, the court concluded that defendant received a full and fair civil trial in this enforcement action. A jury of his peers found against him on most counts and the district court entered judgment against him. The court affirmed. View "SEC v. Jasper" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs appealed from the dismissal of their amended and second amended complaints for failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6). The two complaints asserted claims for relief against defendants under Sections 10(b) and 20(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, 15 U.S.C. 78j(b), 78t(a), and S.E.C. Rule 10b-5, 17 C.F.R. 240.10b-5. Plaintiffs claimed that CBS delayed interim impairment testing of the corporation's intangible assets despite indicia that such a test was necessary at an earlier date. The court affirmed the district court's opinion dismissing the complaints and held that the district court's conclusion was reinforced by Fait v. Regions Fin. Corp. View "City of Omaha v. CBS Corp." on Justia Law