Nonprofit Basics: Director Duties and Best Practices for the Typical Nonprofit Public Benefit Corporation
Bar Exam Toolbox Podcast Episode 167: Listen and Learn -- Direct and Derivative Actions (Corporations)
Bar Exam Toolbox Podcast Episode 124: Listen and Learn -- Duty of Loyalty (Corporations)
Law School Toolbox Podcast Episode 282: Listen and Learn -- Duty of Loyalty (Corporations)
In a recent opinion, In re Pack Liquidating, LLC (Pack Liquidating), the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware held that under Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors of Cybergenics Corp. v. Chinery...more
In re McDonald's Corp. Stockholder Derivative Litig., CA No. 2021-0324-JTL (Del. Ch. March 1, 2023) - A plaintiff can plead an oversight claim against a board by alleging particularized facts to support an inference that...more
A claim for breach of the duty of oversight is known as a Caremark claim, after the landmark Delaware Court of Chancery decision in In re Caremark International Inc. Derivative Litigation (1996). Since then, Delaware courts...more
Since the “Blue Bell Creameries” case in 2019, directors have been justifiably concerned about the rise in popularity of Caremark claims (breaching the duty of oversight in a way that implicates the duty of loyalty)....more
In a far-reaching decision with significant implications, the Delaware Chancery Court recently issued a decision confirming that Caremark duty of oversight obligations extends to senior officers. This will have an immediate...more
On January 25, 2023, in In re McDonald’s Corporation Stockholder Derivative Litigation, Vice Chancellor Travis Laster of Delaware’s Court of Chancery denied a motion to dismiss a derivative lawsuit against David Fairhurst,...more
Recent rulings underscore the attention boards of directors and management must continue to pay to the risks faced by companies across all sectors of the economy and their potential impact on business operations...more
In Firemen’s Ret. Sys. of St. Louis v. Sorenson, C.A. No. 2019-0965-LWW (Del. Ch. Oct. 5, 2021), the Delaware Court of Chancery dismissed a derivative lawsuit against Marriott executives and directors for breaches of the duty...more
In 1996, the Delaware Court of Chancery issued its seminal decision in In re Caremark International Inc. Derivative Litigation, establishing the conditions for director oversight liability under Delaware law. Adopted a decade...more
Investors filed a derivative suit claiming that the company knew about, and failed to mitigate known, existing cybersecurity risks and shortfalls prior to the security breach. In early November, pension funds and...more
Delaware Court of Chancery Dismisses Marriott Data Breach Derivative Suit; DOJ Announces Creation of National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team; Fifth Circuit Applies New Standard for Disgorgement Orders In Securities Cases to...more
SEC’s Disgorgement Authority Expanded Under National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021; Delaware Court of Chancery Rejects Derivative Claim Based On Deficient Anti-Money Laundering Compliance Efforts: “Bad...more
In the famous case of Meinhard v Salmon, Justice Benjamin Cardozo wrote in lofty language that lawyers of maltreated business owners have loved to quote ever since that the duty of loyalty among closely-held business owners...more
On April 27, 2020, the Delaware Court of Chancery for the third time in a year denied a motion to dismiss a Caremark claim. The case, Hughes v. Hu, involves a derivative claim against the audit committee and officers of a...more
Section 220 of the Delaware General Corporation Law affords stockholders a qualified right to inspect a corporation's books and records. A Section 220 inspection is a powerful stockholder right, and indeed, the Delaware...more
Board oversight of significant company risk areas and legal compliance deserves renewed attention, as the Delaware Supreme Court recently ruled that monitoring practices that have previously been considered acceptable may...more
The Situation: Directors of Blue Bell Creameries USA, Inc. ("Blue Bell") were sued for breach of fiduciary duty following a lethal listeria outbreak in its ice cream facilities. Applying the duty of oversight first...more
In Marchand v. Barnhill, No. 533, 2018, 2019 Del. LEXIS 310 (Del. June 18, 2019), the Delaware Supreme Court (Strine, C.J.) reversed a Delaware Court of Chancery (Slights, V.C.) order dismissing a derivative claim alleging...more
On June 18, in Marchand v. Barnhill, the Delaware Supreme Court reversed a ruling by the Delaware Court of Chancery in a shareholder derivative suit alleging a breach of the duty of loyalty. While the standard for a...more
Stein v. Blankfein, C.A. No. 2017-0354-SG (Del. Ch. May 31, 2019). Recently, the Delaware Supreme Court held in In re Investors Bancorp, Inc. Stockholder Litigation, 177 A.3d 1208 (Del. 2017) that stockholder approval of...more
The Delaware Supreme Court recently took the opportunity to revisit Caremark with its en banc decision in Marchand v. Barnhill, No. 533, 2018 (Del. June 19, 2019). In Marchand, the Court reversed the dismissal of a...more
In Marchand v. Barnhill et al. (“Blue Bell”),1 the Delaware Supreme Court on June 19 unanimously reversed the dismissal of a shareholder derivative lawsuit against the members of the board of directors and two officers of...more
On June 18, 2019, in a decision authored by Chief Justice Leo E. Strine Jr., the Delaware Supreme Court en banc reversed the dismissal of a stockholder derivative suit against the directors and officers of Blue Bell...more
On June 18, 2019, in Marchand v. Barnhill, the Delaware Supreme Court, in an opinion written by Chief Justice Leo E. Strine, Jr. on behalf of a unanimous court, issued a decision reversing the Court of Chancery’s dismissal of...more
On April 1, 2019, Vice Chancellor Sam Glasscock III of the Delaware Court of Chancery dismissed for lack of demand a stockholder derivative suit against directors of Uber Technologies, Inc. (“Uber”) that asserted breach of...more