ABA Sound Advice: Conducting Civil Rights Audits: Benefits and Best Practices
The Justice Insiders: The Administrative State is Not Your Friend - A Conversation with Professor Richard Epstein
Litigation developments: federal forum provisions
The "Compass Rose" Method for Corporate Witness Interviews
Investment Management and Private Funds Roundtable: TALF 2020 and PPP Update
Securities Litigation and Disclosure Issues
Investment Management Roundtable Discussion – Regulatory and Enforcement Update
Podcast: Non-binding Guidance: SEC Disclosure Issues for Life Sciences Companies
Life Sciences Quarterly (Q3 2019): SEC Enforcement and Class Actions Regarding FDA Communications
Podcast: Credit Funds: What Managers Need to Know and Practical Tips to Avoid Insider Trading Risks
The Supreme Court recently took away an often-used weapon by shareholder plaintiffs in securities fraud cases, ruling that “pure omissions” from periodic SEC filings (absent any other duty to disclose) are not actionable...more
On June 1, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court (the Supreme Court) issued a much-anticipated decision in the case captioned Slack Technologies, LLC, fka Slack Technologies, Inc. (Slack), et al. v. Pirani (the Slack Decision), which...more
A unanimous Supreme Court today made it more difficult for shareholders to file suits under Section 11 of the Securities Act of 1933 (the Securities Act or the Act). The Court held in Slack Technologies, LLC v. Fiyyaz Pirani...more
Yesterday the United States Supreme Court heard oral argument in a case raising questions of when investors have standing to sue under Sections 11 and 12(a)(2) of the Securities Act of 1933 (the “Securities Act”). Slack...more
On February 21, 2023, the United States Supreme Court formally dismissed the appeal of a case in which a settlement had been announced after certiorari was granted to review a decision by a California state court allowing...more
In 2022, there were 197 federal securities class actions filed, which is a slight drop from the 211 filings in 2021, and a significant drop from the over 400 filings in 2017, 2018, and 2019, and over 300 in 2020. There were...more
Alston & Bird’s Securities Litigation Group analyzes the issues facing the U.S. Supreme Court in an appeal that will determine whether companies face potential liability under the 1933 Act for shares made available to the...more
One of the most significant differences between bringing a securities lawsuit in state versus federal court is the application of the mandatory discovery stay set forth in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act (the...more
On July 2, 2021, the US Supreme Court granted the Petition for a Writ of Certiorari filed in Pivotal Software, to address one of the many questions stemming from the Court’s decision in Cyan, which permitted state courts to...more
Ruling suggests a new means of stemming the flood tide of state-court Securities Act claims that followed the U.S. Supreme Court’s Cyan decision in 2018. But uncertainty lingers as to whether post-IPO public companies can...more
We are pleased to present our annual year-end update on financial reporting and issuer disclosure enforcement activity for 2019. This White Paper focuses on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's ("SEC") enforcement...more
On February 25, 2019, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Institute of Legal Reform (the “ILR”) published a report entitled “Containing the Contagion: Proposals to Reform the Broken Securities Class Action System” (the “Report”)....more
In 2017, courts across this country were split on whether plaintiffs could assert a class action alleging claims under the Securities Act of 1933 (which provides a private right of action against issuers and others for...more
As anticipated, securities class action filings remained high in 2018, with more than 400 filings in federal court, and the number is expected to remain high in 2019. While the total number is slightly less than in 2017, it...more
On December 19, 2018, the Delaware Chancery Court held that a business incorporated in Delaware could not use its corporate charter or bylaws to require that its shareholders bring any securities claims under the Securities...more
On December 19, 2018, The Delaware Court of Chancery held in Sciabacucchi v. Salzberg that Delaware corporations cannot use charter or bylaw provisions to mandate that claims under the Securities Act of 1933 (‘33 Act) must be...more
On December 19, 2018, the Delaware Court of Chancery held that forum selection provisions contained in the certificate of incorporation of Delaware corporations are invalid to the extent that they require any claim under the...more
In March 2018, in Cyan Inc. v. Beaver County Employees Retirement Fund, SCOTUS held that state courts continue to have concurrent jurisdiction over class actions alleging only ’33 Act violations by private plaintiffs and that...more
In a recent ruling in In re: BP p.l.c. Securities Litigation the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas dismissed claims asserted by opt-out plaintiffs as time barred by the Exchange Act’s statute of...more
“The distinction between primary and secondary liability matters...For decades...the SEC has tried to erase that distinction...” Lorenzo v. SEC, 872 F. 3d 578, 601 (D.C. Cir. 2017) (Kavenaugh, Circuit Judge, dissenting). ...more
In 2017, federal securities class actions were filed at a rapid clip, averaging more than one per day – a level not seen in nearly 20 years according to survey data. It was the third year of growth and a 44% increase over...more
On March 20, 2018, a unanimous United States Supreme Court, in Cyan, Inc. v. Beaver Cty. Employees Ret. Fund, No. 15-1439, 2018 WL 1384564, answered two questions concerning investors' ability to pursue alleged violations of...more
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that class action plaintiffs can bring claims under the Securities Act of 1933 in either state or federal court. ...more
In Cyan, Inc. v. Beaver County Employees Retirement Fund, No. 15-1439, decided on March 20, 2018, the Supreme Court unanimously held that class actions based solely on the Securities Act of 1933 (33 Act) may be brought in...more
The U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision on March 20 holding that investors are free to file securities class action lawsuits challenging the veracity of stock registration statements under Section 11 of the...more