On December 5, 2023, a three-judge panel in In re Facebook, Inc. Sec. Litig., 87 F.4th 934 (9th Cir. 2023) (“In re Facebook”) voted to deny the defendant appellee Facebook, Inc.’s (“Facebook”) petition for panel rehearing and rehearing en banc of the Ninth Circuit’s October 18, 2023 ruling reversing the dismissal of claims against Facebook….Read more

Do Companies that Embrace Diversity Achieve Improvements in Performance?   For more than a decade, empirical studies, observations, and simple logic have provided support for the argument that corporate boardroom diversity is good for long term corporate performance and shareholder value. Over the past year, however, the social justice movement has brought heightened attention to…Read more

Risk Management Questions to Minimize Liabilities and Optimize Your Institution’s Securities Litigation Policies and Procedures   Securities class actions remain an omnipresent part of the investing landscape. They continue to evolve and become more, not less complex. That makes the decision to select an external vendor for any part of the securities class action lifecycle…Read more

Data is both omnipresent and ephemeral. Access to data, especially historical data, is a condition precedent to the ability file claims in settled securities class actions. Institutions have a fiduciary duty to file those claims, or to show that choosing not to do so was prudent. If an institution does not take a proactive approach…Read more

Institutional investors—including public pension funds, Taft-Hartley funds, mutual funds, and hedge funds—have a fiduciary obligation to recover monies lost through investments in public securities as the result of corporate mismanagement and/or fraud. These losses are often recouped through class action litigation, which pays out billions of dollars to defrauded investors each year.1 When these lawsuits are…Read more

Much ink has been spilled, much breath expended, and many hands have been wrung over the last decade on the lack of diversity in corporate boardrooms. That chorus only intensified over the last year as protests over racial inequity poured out into the streets of cities across the country.    While companies continue to make…Read more

As fiduciaries, institutional investors have a responsibility to monitor their investment portfolios, protect and maximize their assets, and ensure that no money that should have been awarded to their funds is left unclaimed. If investment funds are lost due to fraud or mismanagement, the trustees and management are responsible for using their best efforts to…Read more

Shareholder returns, especially gains that drive benefits to pension fund beneficiaries are realized by making good investments. However, no portfolio can outperform if the underlying investments are comprised of companies that do not prioritize good corporate governance. When left unchecked, corporate insiders sometimes neglect their duties and act in their own best interests, rather than…Read more