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Full-Text Articles in Securities Law
Uncovering The Hidden Conflicts In Securities Class Action Litigation: Lessons From The State Street Case, Benjamin P. Edwards, Anthony Rickey
Uncovering The Hidden Conflicts In Securities Class Action Litigation: Lessons From The State Street Case, Benjamin P. Edwards, Anthony Rickey
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Courts, Congress, and commentators have long worried that stockholder plaintiffs in securities and M&A litigation and their counsel may pursue suits that benefit themselves rather than absent stockholders or the corporations in which they invest. Following congressional reforms that encouraged the appointment of institutional stockholders as lead plaintiffs in securities actions, significant academic commentary has focused on the problem of “pay to play”—the possibility that class action law firms encourage litigation by making donations to politicians with influence over institutional stockholders, particularly public sector pension funds.
A recent federal securities class action in the District of Massachusetts, however, suggests that …
Securities Class Actions As Pragmatic Ex Post Regulation, Elizabeth Chamblee Burch
Securities Class Actions As Pragmatic Ex Post Regulation, Elizabeth Chamblee Burch
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Securities class actions are on the chopping block-again. Traditional commentators continue to view class actions with suspicion; they see class suits as nonmeritorious byproducts of self-interest and the attorneys who bring them as rent-seekers. Their conventional approach has popularized securities class actions' negative effects. High-profile commissions capitalizing on this rhetoric, such as the Committee on Capital Markets Regulation, have recently recommended eliminating or severely curtailing securities class actions. But this approach misses the point: in the ongoing push and pull of securities regulation, corporations are winning the battle.
Thus, understanding the full picture and texture of securities class actions necessitates …
Reassessing Damages In Securities Fraud Class Actions, Elizabeth Chamblee Burch
Reassessing Damages In Securities Fraud Class Actions, Elizabeth Chamblee Burch
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No coherent doctrinal statement exists for calculating open-market damages for securities fraud class actions. Instead, courts have tried in vain to fashion common-law deceit and misrepresentation remedies to fit open-market fraud. The result is a relatively ineffective system with a hallmark feature: unpredictable damage awards. This poses a significant fraud deterrence problem from both a practical and a theoretical standpoint.
In 2005, the Supreme Court had the opportunity to clarify open-market damage principles and to facilitate earlier dismissal of cases without compensable economic losses. Instead, in Dura Pharmaceuticals v. Broudo, it further confused the damage issue by (1) perpetuating the …