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Fiduciary Duty Demand Futility Shareholder Litigation

Morris James LLP

Chancery Dismisses Executive Compensation Action For Failure To Plead Demand Futility

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Eckert v. Hightower, C.A. No. 2024-0569-MTZ (Del. Ch. Mar. 24, 2025) - A board of directors approved compensation packages for the company’s CEO, who also was its controlling stockholder. The CEO was a member of the...more

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Chancery Finds that Would-Be Caremark Plaintiffs Failed to Plead Demand Futility

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Bricklayers Pension Fund of W. Pa. v. Brinkley, C.A. No. 2022-1118-MTZ (Del. Ch. July 12, 2024) - In derivative cases where a stockholder-plaintiff has not made a pre-suit demand on the board of directors, demand futility...more

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Chancery Holds That Demand Was Not Wrongfully Refused When Considered by Working Group

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In re Kraft Heinz Demand Refused Derivative Stockholder Litig., Consol. C.A. No. 2022-0398-LWW (Del. Ch. July 19, 2024) - By making a demand, a stockholder-plaintiff tacitly concedes that the board can impartially consider...more

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Court of Chancery Rejects ‘Caremark’ Liability for Imperfect Compliance With Legal Obligations

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Delaware corporations are not permitted to pursue profits by violating the law. Under Caremark and its progeny, directors’ fiduciary duties include the good faith obligation to oversee and monitor the corporation’s compliance...more

Hogan Lovells

In re Cognizant Technology: Third Circuit adopts de novo review for failure to plead demand futility

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In re Cognizant Technology Solutions Corporation Derivative Litigation, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, sitting en banc, overruled its prior decision in Blasband v. Rales that applied an...more

Morris James LLP

Chancery Holds Plaintiff Fails to Meet Rule 23.1 Pleading Standard, Dismisses Action Arising From T-Mobile Data Hack

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Harper v. Sievert, C.A. No. 2022-0819-SG (Del. Ch. May 31, 2024). A stockholder plaintiff brought derivative claims alleging that current and former directors of T-Mobile US, Inc. were liable for aggregating customers’...more

Morris James LLP

Chancery Dismisses Derivative Action Based on Plaintiff’s Failure to Allege Particularized Facts Demonstrating Demand Futility

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The power to bring a claim for breach of duty causing injury to a Delaware corporation resides with the board of directors. It is part of their duty under Section 141(a) of the Delaware General Corporation Law to manage the...more

A&O Shearman

Delaware Court Of Chancery Dismisses Derivative Claim For Breach Of Duty Of Oversight, Finding Failure To Establish Demand...

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On February 19, 2024, Vice Chancellor Lori Will of the Delaware Court of Chancery dismissed a derivative breach of fiduciary duty action against nominal defendant Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. (the “Company”) and its board...more

Morris James LLP

Chancery Dismisses Double-Derivative Claims for Failure To Plead Demand Futility

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City of Hialeah Emps. Ret. Sys. v. Insight Venture Partners, C.A. No. 2022-0846-MTZ (Del. Ch. Dec. 28, 2023) - A venture capital fund invested in two different entities. One of the entities then acquired the other. In the...more

Morris James LLP

Chancery Finds That Books and Records Incorporated by Reference in Complaint Demonstrate the Lack of a Valid Caremark Claim

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Joel Newman v. KKR Phorm Investors, L.P., et al. C.A. No. 2022-0310-NAC (Del. Ch. Aug. 31, 2023). At the motion to dismiss stage, Delaware courts will consider the facts alleged in the complaint as well as the documents...more

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Newman v. KKR: Suit dismissed by Delaware Chancery Court for failure to plead demand futility

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In Newman v. KKR, the Delaware Court of Chancery dismissed a shareholder suit against Transphorm, Inc.’s Board and KKR, the largest shareholder, for failure to plead demand futility. The plaintiff alleged that the Board...more

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Lebanon County Employees’ Retirement Fund v. Collis: Guidance into timeliness of derivative claims

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In Lebanon County Employees’ Retirement Fund v. Collis, C.A. No. 2021-1118-JTL (Del. Ch. Dec. 15, 2022), the Delaware Court of Chancery denied a motion to dismiss as untimely a derivative action against a pharmaceutical...more

A&O Shearman

Delaware Court Of Chancery Assesses The Application Of Timeliness Principles To Caremark Red Flags Claim And Applies “Separate...

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On December 15, 2022, Vice Chancellor J. Travis Laster of the Delaware Court of Chancery denied a motion to dismiss claims as untimely in a derivative action brought by stockholders against the officers and directors of...more

Hogan Lovells

In re Carvana: Demand is futile when directors are “thick as thieves” with beneficiary of misconduct

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The Delaware Court of Chancery, in In re Carvana Co., No. 2020-0415-KSJM (Del. Ch. June 30, 2022), applied the recently adopted Zuckerberg test for demand futility and denied the defendants’ motion to dismiss. The court found...more

A&O Shearman

Delaware Court Of Chancery Dismisses Derivative Suit For Failure To Allege Substantial Likelihood Of Liability Sufficient To...

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On June 30, 2022, Chancellor Kathaleen St. J. McCormick of the Delaware Court of Chancery granted a motion to dismiss derivative claims for breach of fiduciary duty brought by a stockholder of an energy company (the...more

A&O Shearman

Eighth Circuit Affirms Dismissal Of Merger-Related Derivative Suit For Failure To Plead Demand Excusal

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On April 7, 2022, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed the dismissal of derivative claims brought by shareholders of Centene Corporation (the “Corporation”) against directors and officers of the...more

Morris James LLP

Chancery Dismisses Derivative Action Arising from $1.2 Billion Stock Sale Based on Plaintiffs’ Failure to Plead Demand Futility

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In re Kraft Heinz Co. Deriv. Litig., Cons. C.A. No. 2019-0587-LWW (Del. Ch. Dec. 15, 2021) - The Court of Chancery dismissed an insider-trading action on the grounds that plaintiffs failed to plead that a majority of a...more

Hogan Lovells

In re Kraft Heinz Company Derivative Litigation: Plaintiffs fail to plead demand futility - Quarterly Corporate / M&A Decisions...

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In re Kraft Heinz Company Derivative Litigation addresses demand futility in a case involving an insider stock sale. 3G Capital, Inc., a 24.2 percent shareholder in Kraft Heinz, sold 7 percent of its stake in August 2018...more

Lowenstein Sandler LLP

Delaware’s New Universal Demand-Futility Test

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On Sept. 23, the Delaware Supreme Court endorsed a new universal three-part demand-futility test in United Food and Commercial Workers Union and Participating Food Industry Employers Tri-State Pension Fund v. Zuckerberg, et...more

Holland & Knight LLP

Delaware Supreme Court Adopts Universal 3-Part Test to Assess Demand Futility

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In a Sept. 23, 2021, decision that may make it easier for Delaware boards of directors to obtain an early dismissal of derivative suits brought against them, the Delaware Supreme Court in United Food and Commercial Workers...more

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United Food’s “New” Delaware Demand Futility Test: The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same

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On September 23, 2021, in United Food and Commercial Workers Union v. Zuckerberg et al., the Delaware Supreme Court restated and refined the demand futility test for bringing shareholder derivative claims when it affirmed the...more

Goodwin

Northern District of California Kicks Shareholder Derivative Suit Against Alphabet, Inc. for Failing to Allege Demand Futility

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Northern District of California Kicks Shareholder Derivative Suit Against Alphabet, Inc. For Failing to Allege Demand Futility; Rare Securities “Holder’s Claim” Trial Results in Jury Verdict for Defendants; Delaware Court of...more

Morris James LLP

Chancery Questions Utility of Aronson Test, Dismisses Derivative Suit of Facebook Stockholder for Failure To Allege Demand...

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United Food and Comm. Workers Union v. Zuckerberg, C.A. No. 2018-0671-JTL (Del. Ch. Oct. 26, 2020) - In its recent decision in United Food and Comm. Workers Union v. Zuckerberg, the Court of Chancery discussed the legal...more

McCarter & English, LLP

The Court Of Chancery Dismisses Derivative Suit Against Truecar Officers And Directors, Finding Plaintiffs Failed To Allege...

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Under Court of Chancery Rule 23.1, a stockholder who wishes to bring a derivative claim on behalf of a corporation must “allege with particularity the efforts, if any, made by the plaintiff to obtain the action the plaintiff...more

Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP

Delaware Court of Chancery Addresses Pleading ‘With Particularity’ Under Rule 23.1

Rule 23.1 of the Delaware Court of Chancery Rules requires a plaintiff asserting a shareholder derivative action to plead “with particularity the efforts, if any, made by the plaintiff to obtain the action the plaintiff...more

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