Asset Management

  • July 30, 2024

    Financial Co. To Pay $20M To Resolve DOL Embezzlement Suit

    A financial planner agreed to pay $20 million to 17 retirement plans it manages to resolve a lawsuit from the U.S. Department of Labor accusing it of improperly shuffling money between accounts and embezzling at least $5 million in plan assets, a filing in Pennsylvania federal court said.

  • July 29, 2024

    Truth Social SPAC, Sponsors Battle In Chancery Over Payout

    Attorneys for a founding investor in the special purpose acquisition company that took former President Donald Trump's social media site public told a Delaware vice chancellor Monday the SPAC ignored its charter and withheld information about the deal in order to avoid paying tens of millions in anti-dilution protection.

  • July 29, 2024

    Virtu Pushes For SEC Crackdown On 'Penny Stock' Listings

    Virtu Financial Inc. is pressing the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to force Nasdaq and other exchanges to crack down on so-called penny stocks, petitioning the agency to initiate rulemaking that would stop companies struggling to stay above $1 per share from continuing to trade on the exchanges.

  • July 29, 2024

    BofA, Citi Among Banks In $80M Deal To End Bond-Rig Suit

    Units of Bank of America, Citigroup and other banking giants have agreed to pay $80 million to settle investor claims accusing them of conspiring to fix European government bond prices.

  • July 29, 2024

    9th Circ. Axes Limit On DOL Denying Calif. Agencies Grants

    The U.S. Department of Labor can shut California transit agencies out of a federal grant because of a conflict between a state pension law and a federal transit law, with the Ninth Circuit lifting a ban Monday on the agency denying grant applications because of that conflict.

  • July 29, 2024

    Firm Partners Ask Fla. Court To Toss Investor's Derivative Suit

    Two partners in a law firm have asked a Florida court to dismiss a derivative lawsuit brought by an investor claiming that they orchestrated a litigation funding fraud, arguing that the investor has no right to bring the suit without a vote from the other members of the company.

  • July 29, 2024

    4 Takeaways After Courts Block ERISA Advice Regs

    Two Texas federal judges' takedowns of the U.S. Department of Labor's recently expanded definition of a fiduciary under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act has limited the agency's authority to oversee certain kinds of retirement investment advice, attorneys say, including some rollover situations. Here, Law360 looks at four things benefits lawyers have taken away from the decisions.

  • July 29, 2024

    Magistrate Eyes Cuts To Norfolk Southern Investors' Suit

    A New York federal magistrate judge has recommended tossing a portion of a securities suit filed against Norfolk Southern Corp. in the wake of the East Palestine, Ohio, train derailment, reasoning that the retirement funds serving as lead plaintiffs fell short of pleading standards.

  • July 29, 2024

    Ackman's IPO For New Pershing Square Fund Faces Delay

    Hedge-fund giant Bill Ackman is still proceeding with an estimated $2.5 billion to $4 billion initial public offering of his new closed-end investment fund, Pershing Square USA Ltd., though the date of pricing is undetermined, according to the new fund.

  • July 29, 2024

    SEC OKs Award Of More Than $37M To Whistleblower

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has awarded more than $37 million to an anonymous whistleblower the agency credits for spurring a successful enforcement action despite retaliation from an unidentified employer.

  • July 29, 2024

    Commonwealth Financial Attacks SEC's 'Staggering' $93M Win

    Commonwealth Financial Network has asked the First Circuit to overturn what it called a "staggering" $93 million penalty it was ordered to pay to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, arguing that its alleged failure to disclose conflicts of interest to investor clients was harmless.

  • July 29, 2024

    Kirkland-Led Amulet Closes $1.2B Health-Focused Fund

    Kirkland & Ellis LLP-advised private equity shop Amulet Capital Partners LP on Monday announced that it successfully closed its third healthcare-focused private equity fund with roughly $1.2 billion in tow.

  • July 29, 2024

    Davis Polk Adds Ex-Simpson Thacher Funds Partner In DC

    Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP announced Monday that a former Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP funds attorney joined the firm's investment management practice as a partner in Washington, D.C.

  • July 29, 2024

    Mich. AG Drops Remaining Case Against Carhartt Heiress Atty

    Prosecutors will not retry a Michigan attorney they claim stole from his wealthy client, the late Carhartt company heiress Gretchen Valade, and have agreed to toss similar embezzlement charges in a separate case. 

  • July 29, 2024

    Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court

    Litigation linked to Elon Musk sparked several filings in Delaware's Court of Chancery last week, including a call for sanctions and hand-wringing about a proposed multibillion-dollar attorney fee. Here, Law360 looks at this and other highlights from last week in Delaware's Chancery Court.

  • July 29, 2024

    White Collar Update: 4 Developments To Watch

    White-collar lawyers are on the lookout for U.S. Department of Justice actions targeting artificial intelligence "snake oil," aggressive pandemic-relief fraud prosecutions, and carrots for corporations and whistleblowers who expose misconduct. Here's a look at some key developments to watch in the second half of 2024.

  • July 29, 2024

    ECJ Nixes Swedish Dividends Tax On Foreign Pension Funds

    Sweden can't collect a withholding tax on dividends distributed by Swedish companies to public pension funds abroad while exempting its own public funds because that is inconsistent with European Union law requiring the free movement of capital, the European Court of Justice said Monday.

  • July 29, 2024

    Remainder Of DOL Fiduciary Regs Blocked In Texas

    A Texas federal judge froze the remainder of a package of regulations from the U.S. Department of Labor expanding the definition of a fiduciary under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, after a judge blocked most of the policy in an adjacent district the day before.

  • July 29, 2024

    EU's Highest Court Upholds Disclosure Law

    The European Union's highest court on Monday upheld the bloc's law requiring tax advisers to report potentially aggressive cross-border tax arrangements, rejecting a challenge from Belgian tax attorneys who said their country's implementation of the EU's DAC6 law violated European law.

  • July 26, 2024

    Ex-Wells Fargo Director Wins $22M Verdict In ADA Trial

    A North Carolina federal jury Friday determined Wells Fargo must pay a former managing director $22.1 million after he accused the bank of failing to reasonably accommodate him for a paralyzed colon and bladder, and subsequently laid him off to avoid dealing with his disability, according to his attorney.

  • July 26, 2024

    SEC Sues Banker And Ex-Prosecutor Alleging $1.6M Fraud

    A Georgia banker fraudulently bilked approximately $1.6 million from unsuspecting investors for "furs and furniture" and other expenses while a former Florida prosecutor ignored several red flags when holding on to the investments, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission told a Georgia federal court.

  • July 26, 2024

    Franklin Says DOJ, SEC Probing Western Asset Management

    Western Asset Management, a global fixed-income manager, is facing parallel investigations from the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission over some of its past trade allocations, its parent Franklin Resources Inc. said Friday.

  • July 26, 2024

    Matterport Stockholder Sues In Del. For Books On Merger

    A shareholder of 3D-imaging and digitization venture Matterport Inc. has launched a Delaware Court of Chancery lawsuit seeking company documents, citing concerns that the business was selling itself to global real estate analytics company CoStar Group in part to protect insider equity from pending litigation.

  • July 26, 2024

    Kinder Morgan Shorted Early Retirement Benefits, Judge Says

    A pension plan inherited by Kinder Morgan Inc. when it acquired El Paso Corp. was wrongly amended to prevent workers from accumulating early retirement benefits, a Texas federal judge ruled, siding with a class of retirees who claimed the changes violated federal benefits law.

  • July 26, 2024

    Chancery Questions $3.5M Atty Fee For Failed Proxy Battle

    An activist shareholder that launched a failed proxy contest at First Foundation Inc. struggled to convince a Delaware Chancery Court judge Friday that the settlement it reached with the Texas-based bank was worth a $3.5 million attorney fee.

Expert Analysis

  • How To Survive Shareholder Activism

    Author Photo

    In an era where shareholder activism is on the rise, companies must identify weaknesses, clearly communicate strategies, update board composition and engage with shareholders consistently in order to avoid disruptive shareholder activism and safeguard the interests of both the company and its shareholders, say J.T. Ho at Orrick and Greg Taxin at Spotlight Advisors.

  • 'Outsourcing' Ruling, 5 Years On: A Warning, Not A Watershed

    Author Photo

    A New York federal court’s 2019 ruling in U.S. v. Connolly, holding that the government improperly outsourced an investigation to Deutsche Bank, has not undercut corporate cooperation incentives as feared — but companies should not completely ignore the lessons of the case, say Temidayo Aganga-Williams and Anna Nabutovsky at Selendy Gay.

  • Series

    Serving In The National Guard Makes Me A Better Lawyer

    Author Photo

    My ongoing military experience as a judge advocate general in the National Guard has shaped me as a person and a lawyer, teaching me the importance of embracing confidence, balance and teamwork in both my Army and civilian roles, says Danielle Aymond at Baker Donelson.

  • Big Business May Come To Rue The Post-Administrative State

    Author Photo

    Many have framed the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decisions overturning Chevron deference and extending the window to challenge regulations as big wins for big business, but sand in the gears of agency rulemaking may be a double-edged sword, creating prolonged uncertainty that impedes businesses’ ability to plan for the future, says Todd Baker at Columbia University.

  • Will Texas Stock Exchange Provide Regulatory Haven?

    Author Photo

    While the newly proposed Texas Stock Exchange may represent a market reaction to increasingly complex regulations, those looking to list on a national securities exchange should consider that their choice of an exchange may not relieve them of some of the most burdensome public company requirements, say Elizabeth McNichol and Ryan Lilley at Katten.

  • A Midyear Forecast: Tailwinds Expected For Atty Hourly Rates

    Author Photo

    Hourly rates for partners, associates and support staff continued to rise in the first half of this year, and this growth shows no signs of slowing for the rest of 2024 and into next year, driven in part by the return of mergers and acquisitions and the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence, says Chuck Chandler at Valeo Partners.

  • Opinion

    Discount Window Reform Needed To Curb Modern Bank Runs

    Author Photo

    We learned during the spring 2023 failures that bank runs can happen extraordinarily fast in light of modern technology, especially when banks have a greater concentration of large deposits, demonstrating that the antiquated but effective discount window needs to be overhauled before the next crisis, says Cris Cicala at Stinson.

  • Series

    After Chevron: Creating New Hurdles For ESG Rulemaking

    Author Photo

    The U.S. Supreme Court's Loper Bright decision, limiting court deference to agencies' statutory interpretations, could have significant impacts on the future of ESG regulation, creating new hurdles for agency rulemaking around these emerging issues, and calling into question current administrative actions, says Leah Malone at Simpson Thacher.

  • A Timeline Of Antisemitism Legislation And What It Means

    Author Photo

    What began as hearings in the House of Representatives Committee on Education and the Workforce has expanded to a House-wide effort to combat antisemitism and related issues, with wide-ranging implications for education, finance and nonprofit entities, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

  • Opinion

    States Should Loosen Law Firm Ownership Restrictions

    Author Photo

    Despite growing buzz, normalized nonlawyer ownership of law firms is a distant prospect, so the legal community should focus first on liberalizing state restrictions on attorney and firm purchases of practices, which would bolster succession planning and improve access to justice, says Michael Di Gennaro at The Law Practice Exchange.

  • 50 Years Later, ERISA Remains A Work In Progress

    Author Photo

    A look at the 50 years since the Employee Retirement Income Security Act’s passage shows that while the law safeguards benefits through vesting rules, fiduciary responsibilities and anti-discrimination provisions, the act falls short in three key areas, says Carol Buckmann at Cohen & Buckmann.

  • Series

    Solving Puzzles Makes Me A Better Lawyer

    Author Photo

    Tackling daily puzzles — like Wordle, KenKen and Connections — has bolstered my intellectual property litigation practice by helping me to exercise different mental skills, acknowledge minor but important details, and build and reinforce good habits, says Roy Wepner at Kaplan Breyer.

  • Dapper Settlement Offers Rules Of The Road For NFT Issuers

    Author Photo

    The terms of a $4 million settlement in a class action alleging that Dapper Labs sold its NBA Top Shot Moments as unregistered securities may be a model for third parties that wish to avoid securities liability in connection with offering digital asset non-fungible token collectibles, say attorneys at K&L Gates.

  • Texas Ethics Opinion Flags Hazards Of Unauthorized Practice

    Author Photo

    The Texas Professional Ethics Committee's recently issued proposed opinion finding that in-house counsel providing legal services to the company's clients constitutes the unauthorized practice of law is a valuable clarification given that a UPL violation — a misdemeanor in most states — carries high stakes, say Hilary Gerzhoy and Julienne Pasichow at HWG.

  • In Memoriam: The Modern Administrative State

    Author Photo

    On June 28, the modern administrative state, where courts deferred to agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes, died when the U.S. Supreme Court overruled its previous decision in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council — but it is survived by many cases decided under the Chevron framework, say Joseph Schaeffer and Jessica Deyoe at Babst Calland.

Want to publish in Law360?


Submit an idea

Have a news tip?


Contact us here
Can't find the article you're looking for? Click here to search the Asset Management archive.
Hello! I'm Law360's automated support bot.

How can I help you today?

For example, you can type:
  • I forgot my password
  • I took a free trial but didn't get a verification email
  • How do I sign up for a newsletter?
Ask a question!