Sky Blog
In Lorenzo v. SEC, the U.S. Supreme Court continued the struggle to define the difference between primary liability and aiding and abetting liability in Rule 10b-5 and other securities fraud claims. The difference matters because private plaintiffs do not have …
Promoting public confidence in securities markets is a policy goal that is frequently cited by commentators, Congress, the courts, regulators, and prosecutors for the adoption and vigorous enforcement of insider trading laws.
For example, in the seminal insider trading case …
In a forthcoming article, I contend that Professor James Spindler has it wrong in his recent critique[1] of scholarly opposition to securities fraud class actions (SFCAs). Spindler argues that the opposition is based on two mistaken ideas: (1) that …
On May 3, the Second Circuit vacated on evidentiary grounds Jesse Litvak’s conviction – after a second trial – on a single count of securities fraud related to trades of residential mortgage backed securities (“RMBS”) and remanded the case to …
Last year, when the Supreme Court revisited the topic of insider trading in Salman v. United States, scholars rehearsed a familiar debate: Should Congress enact a statute that explicitly defines insider trading? Or should it stick with the status …
The number of accounting-related class action lawsuits has increased in recent decades, imposing billions of dollars of direct and indirect costs on public companies and, eventually, their shareholders each year. Although accounting theory says that litigation risk generates accounting conservatism …
A securities class action is a complex event characterized by scarce information, high uncertainty, and increased information asymmetry between stakeholders and firms. In our paper “The Effect of Investor Attention on Fraud Discovery and Value Loss in Securities Class Action …
A recent decision issued by the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, Harrington v. Tetraphase Pharmaceuticals, Inc., highlights the value of established trading plans in defending against securities fraud allegations.[1] These trading plans, which are …
The Supreme Court’s decision last December in Salman v. United States[1] settled important issues concerning Rule 10b-5’s reach over trades based on a tip of confidential material information. One important question, however, remains unanswered: In tipping cases based on …
On July 7, 2017, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit offered significant guidance regarding the circuit’s class certification requirements in In re Petrobras Securities, No. 16-1914. In addressing an issue of first impression, the Second Circuit …
Private Rule 10b-5 lawsuits have inspired volumes of academic literature, much of it focused on the suits’ social benefits (or lack thereof, depending on the author’s perspective). In a chapter for the forthcoming Research Handbook on Representative Shareholder Litigation, I …
To be a public company in the United States is to be subject to an array of federally-imposed disclosure requirements. In my forthcoming article, Reviving Reliance, I describe how the private causes of action available to enforce these requirements …
The U.S. Supreme Court will soon decide an unusual, yet important, case brought by investors in bonds issued by Lehman Brothers, the infamous investment bank that collapsed in September 2008. The case, CalPERS v. ANZ Securities, Inc., is not …
The Supreme Court has long held that “[s]ilence, absent a duty to disclose, is not misleading under Rule 10b-5.”[1] And such a duty to disclose only arises where necessary to make a statement already made not misleading, thus allowing …
It was predictable. Given a solidly Republican Congress and a Republican president, sooner or later, an effort would be made in the Trump administration to curb class actions. Not surprisingly, it has come sooner, with the “Fairness in Class Action …
In recent years, the Securities and Exchange Commission has focused on using quantitative analysis to identify statistical outliers and anomalies through programs like the Aberrational Performance Inquiry, which evaluates hedge fund returns,[1] and the Accounting Quality Model (informally known …
The dominant narrative about Salman v. United States, the first insider trading case decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in almost 20 years, is that it was a big win for federal prosecutors. That is only part of the story.…
Good morning and thank you, Dean (Trevor) Morrison (of New York University Law School) for that very kind introduction. It is a pleasure to be here today and I want to thank the NYU Program on Corporate Compliance and Enforcement
Today (November 16), we will consider the future of financial regulation and, more specifically, whether the Dodd-Frank Act went too far.[1]. I am I happy to share my views with you, but before I begin, I must give
Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Mary Jo White, after nearly four years as the agency’s head, today announced that she intends to leave at the end of the Obama Administration. Under Chair White’s leadership, the Commission strengthened protections for investors …