IPO Securities Litigation

The Initial Public Offering Securities Litigation is one of the largest securities class actions in history. It consists of 309 class actions involving more than 300 initial public offerings ("IPOs") marketed between 1998 and 2000. The actions are coordinated before U.S. District Court Judge Shira A. Scheindlin in the Southern District of New York. The defendants consist of the companies brought public, certain of their officers and directors, and 55 of the investment banks that brought the companies public and underwrote various follow-on offerings.

The lawsuits allege that the IPOs were manipulated by the investment banks to artificially inflate the market price of those securities and to conceal the amounts of compensation actually received by the underwriters.

On April 1, 2009, the parties reached an agreement to resolve all claims against all the defendants in the 309 cases (the “Proposed Global Settlement”). The Proposed Global Settlement provides for a $586 million recovery in total and was submitted to the court for preliminary approval on April 2, 2009.

On June 10, 2009, the Honorable Judge Shira A. Scheindlin of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York granted preliminary approval to the proposed settlement. The opinion and order are available here.

The plaintiffs' attorneys are led by a Court-appointed Executive Committee, of which partner Stan Bernstein serves as Chair.