In its unanimous decision rendered on February 4, 2025, the Delaware Supreme Court reversed the Delaware Court of Chancery’s ruling in the widely followed “TripAdvisor” case (Palkon v. Maffei) regarding the standard of review...more
On December 19, 2022, Chief Justice Seitz issued an opinion for a unanimous Delaware Supreme Court, sitting en banc, reversing and remanding the Delaware Court of Chancery’s decision in Bandera Master Fund LP v. Boardwalk...more
SCOTUS Grants Certiorari to Decide Whether Automatic Discovery Stay Applies to Securities Act Cases in State Court; Delaware Court of Chancery Dismisses Stockholder Suit Against FedEx for Failure to Make Pre-Litigation...more
In Coster v. UIP Companies, Inc., No. 49-2020, 2021 WL 2644094 (Del. June 28, 2021), the Delaware Supreme Court reversed a Court of Chancery ruling, No. 2018-0440-KSJM, 2020 WL 429906 (Del. Ch. Jan. 28, 2020) (McCormick,...more
In Marchand v. Barnhill, a unanimous Delaware Supreme Court imposed substantial new procedural expectations on corporate directors to satisfy their fiduciary duty of oversight related to material risk areas and legal...more
A director’s duty to make a good faith effort to oversee the operations and management of a Delaware company is well-established. In a recent case, Marchand v. Barnhill, the Delaware Supreme Court provided guidance to boards...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
Under Corwin v. KKR Financial Holdings LLC1 and its progeny, “when disinterested, fully informed, uncoerced stockholders approve a transaction absent a looming conflicted controller,” the irrebuttable business judgment rule...more
Developments in appraisal law, the application of Corwin v. KKR Financial Holdings LLC in post-closing damages actions and the potential expansion of Kahn v. M&F Worldwide Corporation (MFW) — a case examining the standard of...more
• The Delaware Supreme Court delivered a gift to the plaintiffs' bar with its recent opinion reversing the Court of Chancery's In Re Investors Bancorp, Inc. Stockholder Litigation decision. • This decision, the first...more
Last week, the Delaware Supreme Court, in In re Investors Bancorp, Inc. Stockholder Litigation (“Bancorp”), reversed the Delaware Court of Chancery and held that awards granted to directors under a stockholder-approved equity...more
• Directors were not entitled to stockholder ratification defense where stockholders only approved the general parameters of director and employee bonuses • This marks the first time in nearly 60 years that Delaware’s...more
On December 13, 2017, the Delaware Supreme Court issued an opinion, In re Investors Bancorp, Inc. Stockholder Litigation, Case No. 169, holding that, except under limited circumstances, the court will not apply the...more
On December 13, 2017, the Delaware Supreme Court reversed the Court of Chancery’s dismissal of fiduciary duty breach claims brought derivatively by stockholders of Investors Bancorp, Inc. against its directors in connection...more
In Dieckman v. Regency GP LP, --- A.3d ---, 2017 WL 243361 (Del. Jan. 20, 2017), the Delaware Supreme Court reversed the Court of Chancery[1] and held that the common unitholder plaintiff’s complaint properly stated a claim...more
The Delaware Supreme Court recently ruled on two appeals from Court of Chancery decisions involving "conflicts committees" of Delaware limited partnerships. Both decisions arise out of challenges to "drop-down" transactions...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: The Delaware Supreme Court recently reversed the dismissal of a derivative complaint for failure to plead demand excusal because it found that certain directors of Zynga Inc. were not independent due to...more
The Delaware Supreme Court recently issued an important decision on the subject of director independence. In Sandys v. Pincus, No. 157, 2016 (Del. Dec. 5, 2016), the Delaware Supreme Court held that certain directors of...more