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Financial Services Law Insights and Observations

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  • Louisiana regulator permits remote annual meetings

    State Issues

    On March 30, the Louisiana Commissioner of Financial Institutions issued an emergency declaration permitting shareholders or members of a financial institution to participate in annual meetings by means of remote communication and permitting institutions to hold virtual annual meetings. The declaration is effective until April 13 unless renewed. 

    State Issues Louisiana Covid-19 Shareholders

  • Alabama governor issues proclamations addressing notary services and remote shareholder meetings

    State Issues

    On March 26, the Alabama governor issued a proclamation permitting remote notarization through videoconferencing, provided that certain requirements are met. A subsequent proclamation, issued on April 2, extended permission for remote notarization to unsupervised, non-attorney notaries and added a record-keeping requirement for such notarizations. Additionally, the proclamation permits remote shareholder meetings pursuant to guidelines and procedures adopted by the corporation’s board of directors, provided that certain requirements are met.

    State Issues Covid-19 Alabama Notary Shareholders Fintech

  • California governor extends tax, licensing deadlines

    State Issues

    On March 25, the governor of California issued an executive order intended to provide relief to small businesses. The order provides businesses filing a return of less than $1 million in taxes with a 90-day extension to file first quarter returns and make tax payments. The order also extended by 60 days deadlines for submitting applications, paying fees, and submitting audited financial reports for a number of business licensees, including card rooms and online payer services.  The order also suspends the requirements to request and receive the consent of shareholders for shareholder meetings to be held by electronic transmission or by electronic video screen communication.

    State Issues Covid-19 California Licensing Shareholders

  • Fed Finalizes Debt-Minimum Rule to Help Banking System Weather Shocks

    Federal Issues

    On December 15, the Fed finalized a rule requiring the biggest global banks to guard against potential collapse by holding minimum amounts of long-term debt and regulatory capital. The rule applies to bank holding companies, U.S. global systemically important banks (GSIB), as well as U.S. branches of foreign banks, and aims to shift the costs of bank failure to shareholders rather than taxpayers by requiring lenders to maintain sufficient amounts of long-term debt, which can be converted to equity to keep a failing bank’s key operations afloat. Specifically, the measure will establish minimum required levels for long-term debt and total loss-absorbing capacity, as well as restrictions on certain short-term debt financing arrangements by parents of GSIB-designated financial institutions. In prepared opening remarks, Fed Chair Janet Yellen explained that “[t]he rule is guided by common sense principles: bank shareholders and debt investors should place their own money at risk so depositors and taxpayers are well protected, and the biggest banks must bear the costs that come with their size.”

    In a memorandum to the Board of Governors, the Fed’s staff noted that covered banks are currently about $70 billion short altogether of the new requirements. The Fed staff estimated that the aggregate increased funding of approximately $680 million to $2 billion annually would be required to make up the shortfall.

    Federal Issues Banking International Shareholders GSIBs Bank Holding Companies

  • Virginia Federal District Court Dismisses Shareholder Derivative Action Related to Credit Card Issuer's Settlements with OCC, CFPB

    Consumer Finance

    On June 21, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia dismissed a shareholder derivative action against a national bank’s officers and directors that was based on the bank’s settlements with the CFPB and OCC over allegedly deceptive marketing of ancillary products. In re Capital One Derivative S’holder Litig., No. 1:12-cv-1100 (E.D. Va. June 21, 2013). The shareholders, relying on Delaware law, alleged that the officers and directors breached their fiduciary duty of loyalty, committed corporate waste, and were unjustly enriched by failing to prevent the allegedly deceptive sales practices at the bank’s third-party call centers which led to the consent orders. The court held that the shareholders did not adequately allege corporate waste because the bank’s settlement payments were not “transfers of assets with no corporate purpose” but instead achieved final resolution of the investigations. The unjust enrichment claim failed because the shareholders did not allege any facts indicating a relationship between the officers and directors’ compensation and the settlements with the agencies. With respect to the duty of loyalty claim, the shareholders alleged two theories: (i) that the officers and directors failed to implement controls that would have prevented the alleged misconduct, and (ii) that defendants ignored numerous “red flags” that should have alerted them to the alleged misconduct.  First, the controls theory failed because the shareholders could not satisfy the demanding Caremark standard, which requires an utter failure to implement any controls. Second, most of the alleged red flags were either not actually red flags at all or there were no allegations that the individual officers and directors were aware of them. However, as to a small number of the alleged red flags, the court found the claims sufficiently plausible to allow the shareholders an opportunity to amend their complaint to add additional facts.

    Credit Cards CFPB Class Action OCC Shareholders

  • Federal Court Allows Shareholder Suit Alleging Concealment of Mortgage-Related Risks to Proceed

    Securities

    On July 11, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York declined to dismiss the majority of the claims brought by a putative class alleging that a national bank, certain of its current and former officers and directors, multiple underwriters, and the bank’s third-party accounting auditor, deliberately concealed the bank’s reliance on an electronic registry system and its exposure to MBS loan repurchase claims. Pa. Pub. Sch. Employee’s Ret. Sys. v. Bank of Am. Corp. No. 11-733, 2012 WL 2847732 (S.D.N.Y. Jul. 11, 2012). In this case, a state retirement system alleges on behalf of similarly situated shareholders that the bank misrepresented that it had “good title” to loans even though multiple courts had blocked the bank’s attempts to foreclosure based on the bank’s use of an electronic registry system. The court, in declining to dismiss these claims, held that the use of the registry system “clouded” the bank’s ownership of many loans, thereby causing the bank to publish misleading shareholder information. The court also declined to dismiss allegations that the defendants misstated or omitted the bank’s exposure to repurchase claims. Further, claims that the bank misled investors about its internal controls also survived. Several other claims, including certain claims against the directors and officers were dismissed without prejudice, while other certain other claims against the defendants were dismissed with prejudice.

    RMBS Shareholders

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