Employer Stock Fund Litigation

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In December 2018, we reported here that the Second Circuit became the first court at any level to allow an ERISA stock-drop claim to survive a motion to dismiss since the Supreme Court revamped the pleading standard for such claims several years ago.  The Second Circuit reinstated a claim for breach of fiduciary duty under…

The Sixth Circuit affirmed the dismissal of ERISA stock drop claims by participants in the Cliffs Natural Resources’ 401(k) Plan. The participants alleged fiduciary breach claims based on public and non-public information arising out of the collapse in iron ore prices that caused the company’s stock price to decline 95%. With respect to the public…

A federal district court in Mississippi ruled for the first time that the “more harm than good” pleading standard established by the Supreme Court in Fifth Third Bancorp v. Dudenhoeffer, 134 S. Ct. 2459 (2014), applied to employer “stock drop” claims brought against the fiduciaries of plans sponsored by closely-held corporations. Hill Brothers Construction…

The R.J. Reynolds defendants have again prevailed against allegations that they breached their fiduciary duties by divesting the RJR 401(k) plan of funds invested in Nabisco stock.  Following remand by the Fourth Circuit, the district court held that a hypothetical fiduciary “would” have divested the plan of the Nabisco investments in the same time and…

The Eleventh Circuit affirmed dismissal of ERISA breach of fiduciary claims against Delta Air Lines and other alleged plan fiduciaries in connection with a defined contribution plan’s investments in Delta Air Lines stock.   In so ruling, the Court joined a growing number of decisions following Dudenhoeffer that have dismissed claims based on public information.

The U.S. Supreme Court recently declined to grant certiorari to review the Fourth Circuit’s decision in RJR Pension Investment, et al. v. Tatum, 761 F.3d 363 (4th Cir. 2014).  As we previously reported here, a divided panel of the Fourth Circuit held that, because the plaintiff proved that the plan fiduciaries acted imprudently…

The Second Circuit recently affirmed the dismissal of an ERISA stock drop class action because, like the district court, it held that Named Plaintiff Debra Taveras lacked constitutional standing to pursue her claims.  Taveras alleged that defendants, which included UBS and a number of individuals, breached their fiduciary duties by maintaining the company stock fund as an investment option in the UBS Savings and Investment Plan.  As relevant here, Taveras’s complaint alleged that “[a]s a direct and proximate result of the breaches of fiduciary duties alleged [in the complaint], the Plans, and indirectly Plaintiffs and the Plans’ other Participants and beneficiaries, lost a significant portion of their investments.”

“As for those who might contemplate future service as plan fiduciaries, all I can say is: Good luck.” 

That was the sentiment expressed in a blistering dissent by Fourth Circuit Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson in the latest ruling in a lawsuit challenging the decision by the fiduicaries of the RJR 401(k) plan to liquidate two stock funds that previously had been available to plan participants wishing to invest in Nabisco stock. Tatum v. RJR Pension Inv. Committee et al., No. 13-1360, 2014 WL 3805677 (4th Cir. Aug. 4, 2014). In a split decision, the panel ruled that, because plaintiff-participant Richard Tatum had proved that the plan fiduciaries acted imprudently by liquidating the stock fund without the benefit of a proper investigation, the burden of proof shifted to defendants to show that a prudent fiduciary would have made the same decision.  In so ruling, the Court reversed the lower court decision, which had found in favor of defendants after a bench trial upon finding that they had demonstrated that a prudent fiduciary could have made the same decision.

The Fourth Circuit’s decision makes a number of significant statements and rulings on the burdens of proof related to loss causation, the meaning of “objective prudence,” and the standards for reviewing decisions pertaining to stock funds in the wake of the Supreme Court’s ruling in Fifth Third v. Dudenhoeffer.  Some of the Court’s pronouncements are difficult to reconcile with existing case law.  If not set aside on en banc or Supreme Court review and if adopted elsewhere, the decision could substantially impact the future conduct of fiduciary breach litigation, as well as plan practices in administering stock funds.