Category Archives: Appellate Monitor

When the U.S. Supreme Court asked for the government’s view on the National Australia Bank cert petition, it seemed a safe bet that the government would encourage the Court to take the case. After all, the SEC had filed an unsuccessful amicus brief in the Second Circuit in favor of the plaintiffs. Here was an opportunity to get a second bite at the apple.

Earlier this week, however, the Solicitor General and SEC filed a joint amicus brief arguing that the Supreme Court should deny cert. The government now asserts that the Second Circuit’s decision was correct, even if its reasoning was wrong.

First, the government argues that the Second Circuit, along with all of the other circuits that have addressed the issue of the “transnational reach of Section 10(b),” have incorrectly described it as one of subject matter jurisdiction. In fact, the relevant jurisdictional provision has no geographical limitation. The need for a connection to the United States is better understood as being related to the elements of the claim. For a private plaintiff (but not the SEC), this includes the requirement that the plaintiff establish a connection between the defendant’s violation and the alleged injury.

Second, the government takes issue with the Second Circuit’s examination of where the “heart of the alleged fraud” took place. To the extent this analysis suggested that the conduct of National Australia Bank’s U.S. subsidiary did not violate Section 10(b) – because it was not the “heart” of the fraud – the holding was “erroneous.” Alternatively, the government proposes the following standard: “it is sufficient if the scheme involves significant conduct within the United States that is material to the fraud’s success.” The U.S. subsidiary’s creation of false information that was incorporated into National Australia Bank’s financial statements was sufficient to establish a violation of Section 10(b) and the SEC could have brought an action based on these facts.

For a foreign private plaintiff, however, an additional assessment must be made. According to the government, “the plaintiff should be required to prove that his loss resulted not simply from the fraudulent scheme as a whole, but directly from the component of the scheme that occurred in the United States.” As to this assessment, the Second Circuit apparently got it right, concluding that causation was too attenuated given all of the activity that took place in Australia prior to the issuance of the false financial statements.

Finally, the government concedes that there is a circuit split over the “conduct” test, with the D.C. Circuit having adopted the most restrictive version. The D.C. Circuit requires that a defendant’s “domestic conduct comprise all the elements . . . necessary to establish a violation of Section 10(b).” Nevertheless, the government argues that National Australia Bank “would not be a suitable vehicle for resolving that division” because the plaintiffs could not prevail under any of the existing conduct tests.

Whatever one makes of the government’s arguments, it’s overall position on granting cert is puzzling. Appellate court misunderstood fundamental legal question? Check. Appellate court applied wrong legal standard? Check. Appellate court decision caused or confirmed existence of circuit split? Check. The U.S. Supreme Court should resolve these important issues? Pass. Stay tuned for the Court’s decision.

Quote of note: “[O]ther nations might perceive affording a private remedy to foreign plaintiffs as circumventing the causes of action and remedies (and the limitations thereon) that those nations provide their own defrauded citizens, particularly if the plaintiff’s principal grievance appears directed at another foreign entity. Absent indications of a contrary congressional intent, the judicially-created private right of action under Section 10(b) should be tailored so as to minimize the likelihood of such international friction.”

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit issued an opinion this week in Indiana State District Council v. Omnicare, Inc., 2009 WL 3365189 (6th Cir. Oct. 21, 2009) that has a few interesting holdings.

(1) Loss causation – The court held that loss causation was inadequately plead as to certain alleged misstatements premised on non-compliance with GAAP. In the absence of any financial restatement and given the continued willingness of Omnicare’s auditors to certify the company’s GAAP compliance, the court concluded that “the complaint does not suggest that the alleged GAAP violations were ever recognized or revealed to the market.”

(2) Confidential Witnesses – The court reaffirmed its willingness to “steeply discount” the statements of confidential witnesses. In the instant case, the plaintiffs provided no information about a key confidential witness “except the title of his position” and there was a disconnect between what the witness knew and the alleged subject matter of the fraud.

(3) Pleading Standard for Section 11 Claims – The court joined the vast majority of other circuits (with the notable exception of the 8th Circuit) in holding that Section 11 claims that “sound in fraud” must be plead with particularity.

Holding: Dismissal of fraud claims affirmed; Section 11 claim remanded for evaluation of whether it met applicable pleading standard.

Quote of note: “Seizing on a few vague statements from management, the plaintiffs try to turn bad corporate news into a securities class action. Because the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act (“PSLRA”) forbids such alchemy, we generally affirm the district court’s dismissal, although we reverse its disposition regarding the claims brought under the Securities Act of 1933.”

There have been two recent appellate decisions discussing the scope of the Securities Litigation Uniform Standards Act of 1998 (“SLUSA”), which pre-empts certain class actions based upon state law that allege a misrepresentation in connection with the purchase or sale of nationally traded securities. The decisions address to what extent the statute requires the dismissal of “claims” as opposed to “actions.”

In Proctor v. Vishay Intertechnology Inc., 2009 WL 3260535 (9th Cir. Oct. 9, 2009) the court found that SLUSA only precluded one of the plaintiff’s three claims. As to the other two claims, the court (largely following a Third Circuit decision from earlier this year) held that they should not be dismissed but, instead, should be remanded to state court for further proceedings.

But what if the plaintiff does not carefully segregate the claims that may be precluded by SLUSA? In Segal v. Fifth Third Bank, 2009 WL 2958438 (6th Cir. Sept. 17, 2009), the complaint expressly disclaimed that any of its state-law claims were based upon alleged misrepresentations, but the court found that this was just “artful pleading” given the complaint’s overall contents. As to the plaintiff’s argument that his state-law claims did not “depend upon” any misrepresentations, the court held that even if the misrepresentations were “extraneous” there was no requirement that a misrepresentation be an element of a claim for the claim to be precluded by SLUSA. The court had “no license to draw a line between SLUSA-covered claims that must be dismissed and SLUSA-covered claims that must not be” and dismissed the entire action.

Although it has not received much publicity (perhaps due to the fact that it does not appear on the agency’s website), last month the Securities and Exchange Commission filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on the issue of primary vs. aiding-and-abetting liability. The case is the Refco securities class action and the SEC takes dead aim at the Second Circuit’s “bright line” test.

Under the “bright line” test, primary liability only exists if the misstatement is attributable on its face to the defendant. In other words, the defendant must have been identified to investors as the maker of the statement. The SEC argues in its amicus brief that public attribution is unnecessary. Instead, a court should be able to find primary liability when the defendant “creates” the statement, even if investors are unaware of the defendant’s involvement.

Given the long history of the “bright line” test in the Second Circuit, combined with the Supreme Court’s recent emphasis in Stoneridge on the need to establish that investors relied on the defendant’s actions, the SEC’s legal arguments may not carry the day. The SEC seems prepared for this possibility, arguing that even if the Second Circuit keeps the “bright line” test, it should not be applied to government actions (where a showing of reliance is not required).

Quote of Note: “In the Commission’s view, a person makes a false or misleading statement and thus can be liable as a primary violator of Rule 10b-5 when that person creates the statement. A person creates a statement in this context if the statement is written or spoken by him, or if he provides the false or misleading information that another person then puts into the statement, or if he allows the statement to be attributed to him.”
Thanks to Securities Docket for the link to the SEC’s amicus brief.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit does not issue many securities litigation decisions, but it apparently has decided to resolve the few cases it has all at once. For the second time in a week (see here), the court has affirmed the dismissal of a securities class action, although this opinion comes with an interesting twist.

In Horizon Asset Management Inc. v. H&R Block, Inc., 2009 WL 2870505 (8th Cir. Sept. 9, 2009) the court considered whether the plaintiffs had adequately plead a strong inference of scienter (i.e., fraudulent intent) in a case alleging financial misstatements. The opinion contains a few holdings of note:

Internal Investigation – The plaintiffs alleged that the slow pace of the internal investigation once the accounting errors where discovered strengthened the inference of scienter. The court disagreed, finding that it was “prudent” for the company to closely investigate the issue and consult with its independent auditors. Moreover, while the investigation was ongoing, the company publicly disclosed its corporate accounting control weaknesses.

Confidential Witness – The court discounted a statement by a confidential witness that he had been told that senior management was aware of the need for further financial restatements. First, the witness did not state whether his sources had actually spoken with senior management, including the individual defendants, or “merely conveyed hearsay information that was passed along by others.” Second, the reliability of the confidential witness was called into question by another, clearly erroneous statement he had made concerning one of the individual defendants.

Corporate Scienter – The plaintiffs argued that even if their complaint did not raise a strong inference of scienter as to the individual officer defendants, the case should still proceed against the company based on the alleged scienter of another one of the company’s officers. The court declined to address whether this imputation was proper because the plaintiffs failed, in any event, to establish a strong inference of scienter as to the officer in question.

The Eighth Circuit affirmed the dismissal of the complaint, but also addressed an unusual procedural issue. The district court had consolidated the various securities class actions and derivative cases brought against H&R Block into one case. It then named a lead plaintiff who declined to assert any derivative fiduciary claims in its consolidated complaint. When the derivative plaintiffs asked for reconsideration of the lead plaintiff decision, the district court denied the motion, finding that the proposed claims were “not really derivative claims.”

On appeal, the court found that while it was “debatable” whether it was appropriate to have a single plaintiff bring both direct and derivative claims, it was erroneous for the district court to have named a single lead plaintiff who would not pursue the derivative claims the court had previously consolidated. Accordingly, the court reinstated the separate derivative complaints.

Holding: Dismissal of securities class action affirmed. Derivative complaints reinstated.

In the early days of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act and its new heightened pleading standards, courts regularly dismissed complaints that engaged in “puzzle pleading” (i.e., failed to specify the exact corporate statements that were false and the basis for their alleged falsity). Although plaintiffs quickly learned to be more careful, puzzle pleadings are still sometimes filed and the consequences can be severe.

In In re 2007 Novastar Financial, Inc. Sec. Litig., 2009 WL 2747281 (8th Cir. Sept. 1, 2009), the court considered a complaint against a subprime lender that “over the course of thirty-six pages . . . reproduced, either in their entirety or lengthy excerpts from, nineteen communications-including press releases, SEC filings, and conference call transcripts-issued by Novastar and the individual defendants during the class period that were allegedly false or misleading.” What the complaint did not do, however, is give “any indication as to what specific statements within these communications are alleged to be false or misleading.”

Although the lead plaintiff identified some specific false statements in his appellate brief, the court found that this did not “excuse” the “failure to comply with the pleading requirements under the PSLRA.” The court also agreed with the district court’s decision to deny leave to amend, noting that the lead plaintiff “never submitted a proposed amended complaint to the district court, nor did he proffer the substance of such an amended complaint until he filed his appellate brief.”
Holding: Dismissal affirmed.

Quote of Note: “[E]ven after the district court dismissed [the lead plaintiff’s] complaint and denied his request to amend the complaint, [the lead plaintiff] failed to file a motion under Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 15(a)(2), 59(e), or 60(b), seeking leave to file an amended complaint. As we have noted before, ‘the district court [i]s not required to engage in a guessing game’ as a result of the plaintiff’s failure to specify proposed new allegations.”

Time to catch up on a decision from a couple of weeks ago that might add some incentive for the Supreme Court to take up the issue of foreign-cubed cases. In In re CP Ships Ltd. Sec. Litig., 2009 WL 2462367 (11th Cir. Aug. 13, 2009), a class member objected to the proposed settlement because it covered certain foreign investors, some of whom might be prevented from participating in a related Canadian securities class action brought against the company. CP Ships is a Canadian company whose shares are traded on both the NYSE and Toronto Stock Exchange.

The court found, in contrast to the Second Circuit’s decision in the National Australia Bank case, that the “conduct test” for subject matter jurisdiction was satisfied. Although the false financial statements were issued abroad as in the Second Circuit case, “not only did the manipulation and falsification of the numbers occur in Florida, the executives with responsibility for ensuring the accuracy of the accounting data operated from Florida.”

Holding: District court properly exercised subject matter jurisdiction over the claims of foreign purchasers.

While it may be relatively easy to plead loss causation in the Fifth Circuit, things become a lot more difficult for plaintiffs when it comes time to offer proof. This week, in Fener v. Belo Corp., 2009 WL 2450674 (5th Cir. Aug. 12, 2009), the court considered a case where the corrective disclosure made by the company attributed a decline in newspaper circulation to three separate sources. Only one of the sources, however, was related to the alleged fraudulent conduct.

On appeal from the lower court’s denial of class certification, the Fifth Circuit found that the plaintiff’s expert report was inadequate. Notably, the plaintiff’s expert failed to distinguish between the three different disclosures in conducting his event study, thereby making it impossible to conclude that the alleged fraud caused a significant amount of the post-disclosure stock price decline.

Holding: Denial of class certification affirmed.

Quote of note: “As the district court correctly held, [plaintiff’s expert] testimony was fatally flawed; he wedded himself to the idea that the press release was only one piece of news and conducted his event study based on that belief. We reject any event study that shows only how a ‘stock reacted to the entire bundle of negative information,’ rather than examining the ‘evidence linking the culpable disclosure to the stock-price movement.’ Because [plaintiffs’ expert] based his study on that incorrect assumption, it cannot be used to support a finding of loss causation.”

There have been two recent appellate decisions of note.

(1) In In re HealthSouth Corp. Sec. Litig., 2009 WL 1675398 (11th Cir. June 17, 2009), the court addressed the scope of the judicial bar order contained in the partial settlement between HealthSouth and the plaintiffs. The court found that the contractural claims by HealthSouth’s former CEO (a non-settling defendant) against the company for (a) indemnification of any amounts he might pay in settlement of his liability to the plaintiffs, and (b) advancement of fees in connection with the litigation, were properly extinguished. (The D&O Diary has a post on the decision that questions the court’s policy rationale for barring the advancement of fees claim.)

Holding: Affirmed.

(2) In Alaska Electrical Pension Fund v. Flowserve Corp., 2009 WL 1740648 (5th Cir. June 19, 2009), the court considered what type of corrective disclosure was necessary to establish loss causation. The defendants argued that “a ‘fact-for-fact’ disclosure of information that fully corrected prior misstatements” was necessary, while the plaintiffs asserted that it was sufficient to point to disclosures that revealed the “true financial condition” of the company. In a per curiam opinion by a panel that included retired Supreme Court Justice O’Connor, however, the court found that “the true standard lies in the middle.” To establish loss causation the “disclosed information must reflect part of the ‘relevant truth’ – the truth obscured by the fraudulent statements,” but the information can leak out over time and a “fact-for-fact” disclosure is not required.

Holding: Reversed and remanded for further proceedings consistent with opinion.

After the U.S. Supreme Court gets done with the statute of limitations, will it turn to the issue of foreign-cubed cases? Bloomberg reports that the Court has asked the Solicitor General to present its views on the National Australia Bank cert petition. At issue in the case is whether a U.S. court should exercise jurisdiction over an action brought against a foreign issuer on behalf of a class of foreign investors who purchased their securities on a foreign exchange (otherwise known as a “foreign-cubed” case).

Thanks to John Letteri for the link to the Bloomberg article.