Popular, Fiduciary Duty, Corporate Counsel

Employers Continue to Face ERISA Tobacco Surcharge Lawsuits, With Mixed Results

Husch Blackwell LLP on 8/6/2025

Recently, companies have seen a spate of class action lawsuits challenging the legality of tobacco cessation wellness programs and related tobacco surcharges imposed by their employer-sponsored health benefit plans....more

The ESG Investing Debate: 2023 Year-end Updates

Morgan Lewis on 1/15/2024

Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing has been subject to increased US state and federal regulation over the last several years, and 2023 continued that status quo. As of January 1, 2024, 20 states have...more

Keeping Up With M&A Case Law – Spotlight on Recent Delaware Decisions

Cooley LLP on 7/21/2023

The mergers & acquisitions market may wax and wane, but one thing in M&A is consistent from year to year: The Delaware courts issue opinions that impact M&A dealmaking. And this year is certainly no exception – Delaware...more

SPAC Litigation Mid-Year Update: Delaware Opens the Gates

Woodruff Sawyer on 6/23/2023

With SPAC IPOs virtually gone but SPAC mergers (aka de-SPACs) continuing at a steady pace since the beginning of the year, the questions around getting a deal done boil down to the following: How and where can companies get...more

DOL Cybersecurity Investigations: The Trap Door to Endless Document Requests?

Groom Law Group, Chartered on 8/29/2022

Parties involved in a Department of Labor (“DOL”) Employee Benefits Security Administration (“EBSA”) investigation often ask a simple question: how much information am I obligated to provide the DOL in response to an...more

UK High Court Rules on Liability of Bitcoin Software Developers

Latham & Watkins LLP on 5/31/2022

The Court held that software developers do not owe a duty of care to bitcoin owners who lost their private keys. In Tulip Trading Ltd (TTL) v. Bitcoin Association for BSV and others, TTL claimed that personal computers of...more

Fiduciary Duty IS Coming to Privacy – Through Your Benefit Plans!

Kilpatrick on 7/22/2021

While all businesses have been grappling with cybersecurity challenges for years, cybersecurity has recently come into focus for retirement plans, health and welfare plans and other ERISA plans due to a new Department of...more

Oracle Granted Partial Summary Judgment in 401(k) Fees/Investment Option Case

McDermott Will & Schulte on 3/26/2019

The US District Court for the District of Colorado granted partial summary judgment to 401(k) fiduciaries, holding that ERISA’s six-year statute of repose barred some claims and rejecting challenges to the plan’s fees....more

Directors and Officers Settle Over Yahoo Hack: A New Chapter in Derivative Litigation?

Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP on 1/10/2019

Yesterday, a Superior Court judge in Santa Clara, California approved what is believed to be the first monetary award to a company in a data breach-related derivative lawsuit....more

Gone Phishing: Employer Faces Liability for Mistakenly Disclosing W-2 Forms to Scammer

Zuckerman Spaeder LLP on 4/26/2018

Phishing. Spoofing. - These words may sound silly, but for employers, they are anything but. Phishing is the attempt to obtain sensitive electronic information—such as usernames, passwords, or financial...more

Delaware Law Updates – Delaware Court Of Chancery Provides Clarity On The “Quasi-Appraisal” Remedy And Post-Closing Claims

McCarter & English, LLP on 6/6/2017

On May 11, 2017, Chancellor Andre G. Bouchard of the Delaware Court of Chancery dismissed with prejudice a putative class action brought by stockholders of networking solutions in In re Cyan, Inc. Stockholders Litigation.[1]...more

“If at First You Don’t Succeed…” - Shareholders Keep Trying to Sue D&Os for Data Security Breaches

Troutman Pepper Locke on 5/24/2017

Several high-profile lawsuits have been filed in recent years by shareholders seeking to hold corporate officers and directors liable for damage resulting from data security breaches. For example, directors and officers at...more

Appeal in Home Depot Data Breach Derivative Action Results in Settlement of Corporate Governance Claims

Mintz - Privacy & Cybersecurity Viewpoints on 5/2/2017

Snatching victory of a sort from the jaws of defeat, shareholders who brought a derivative action alleging that the 2014 Home Depot data breach resulted from officers’ and directors’ breaches of fiduciary duties have reached...more

ERISA Litigation Newsletter - July 2016

Proskauer Rose LLP on 8/1/2016

Editor's Overview - This month we take a look at the plaintiffs' past successes in fee litigations, and the influx of such lawsuits seeking to impose heightened fiduciary standards for 401(k) plans. Regardless of the...more

Pension Plan Sponsors Beware: The Department of Labor Is Investigating Plans That Fail to Locate and Pay Benefits to Terminated...

McCarter & English, LLP on 3/22/2016

A Department of Labor (“DOL”) official recently disclosed a new DOL investigation initiative focusing on the adequacy of defined benefit plan procedures to locate and pay out benefits to terminated vested participants. The...more

Delaware Court Holds Interested Directors Liable for "Fairer Price" In Going Private Transaction

Bracewell LLP on 9/9/2015

In one of the largest ever M&A-related recoveries for shareholders, Vice Chancellor J. Travis Laster ordered Dole Food Company, Inc.’s Chairman and CEO, David Murdock, and Dole’s former President, COO and General Counsel, C....more

M&A Update: Delaware Court Finds Dole Executives Personally Liable for Millions in Damages for Defrauding Stockholders in Buy-Out...

Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP on 8/31/2015

In its August 27th post-trial opinion, In re Dole Food Co., Inc. Stockholder Litigation, the Delaware Chancery Court held Dole executives David Murdock and Michael Carter personally liable for $148 million in damages for...more

A Firewall for the Boardroom: Best Practices to Insulate Directors and Officers From Derivative Lawsuits and Related Regulatory...

Carlton Fields on 8/17/2015

Shortly after the massive 2013 Target data breach, shareholders filed four derivative lawsuits against the company’s directors and some of its officers (13 CARE 624, 3/20/15). The shareholders alleged that the defendants had...more

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