FILING AND SETTLEMENT TRENDS
A recent NERA Economic Consulting (NERA) study provides an overview of federal securities litigation filings in the first half of 2025. This section highlights several notable trends.
A. Filing Trends
Figure 1 below reflects the federal filing rates from 1996 through the first half of 2025. In the first half of 2025, 108 federal cases have been filed. On an annualized basis, that number is lower than the number of cases filed in 2024. That figure is also considerably lower than in the peak years of 2017-2019 but is consistent with the number of filings from 2021 onwards. Note, however, that this figure does not include class action suits filed in state court or state court derivative suits, including those in the Delaware Court of Chancery.
Figure 1:
B. Mix Of Cases Filed In 2023
1. Filings By Industry Sector
As shown in Figure 2 below, the distribution of non-merger objections and non-crypto unregistered securities filings in the first half of 2025 varied somewhat from 2024. Notably, after a dip in 2023, the “Health and Technology Services” sector percentage rose again in 2025, surpassing levels seen in 2021 and 2022. On the other hand, the percentage of “Electronic Technology and Technology Services” filingsremained the same in 2025. Together, “Health and Technology Services” and “Electronic Technology and Technology Services” filings once again comprised well over 50% of filings. Meanwhile, “Finance” sector filings decreased from 10% to 7%.
Figure 2:
2. Filings By Type
As shown in Figure 3 below, Rule 10b-5 filings make up the vast majority of federal filings this year. In fact, filings of other types are as low as they have been in years.
Figure 3:
3. Filings By Circuit
Figure 4 provides insight into the distribution of federal filings by Circuit. Most filings occur in the Second and Ninth Circuits. On an annualized basis, filings in the Second Circuit are down this year. Similarly, the number of filings in the Ninth Circuit on annualized basis is also down significantly from 2024 levels.
Figure 4:
4. Event-Driven And Other Special Cases
Figure 5 illustrates trends in the number of event-driven and other special case filings since 2020. Onan annualized basis, the number of Artificial Intelligence-related filings continued to increase in 2025.By contrast, SPAC and Cybersecurity and Customer Privacy Breach filings have decreased steadily since 2021.
Figure 5:
C. Settlement Trends
As reflected in Figure 6 below, the average settlement value through the first half of 2025 is
$56 million. That is the highest number since 2016 on an inflation-adjusted basis. (Note that the averagesettlement value excludes merger-objection cases, crypto unregistered securities cases, and cases settling for more than $1 billion or $0 to the class.)
Figure 6:
As for median settlement value, it dropped slightly from 2024 to $13 million. (Note that median settlement value excludes settlements over $1 billion, merger objection cases, crypto unregistered securities cases, and zero-dollar settlements.)
Figure 7:
This post comes to us from Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP. It is based on the firm’s memorandum, “Securities Litigation 2025 Mid-Year Update,” dated September 9, 2025, and available here.