A groundbreaking class action ruling by the Federal Court on Thursday that found Myer misled shareholders and accepted the applicant’s market-based causation theory is the only judgment in an Australian securities class action since the first shareholder case was brought 20 years ago, and it might be the only one for years to come.
A judge has ruled that department store Myer engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct and breached its continuous disclosure obligations when it failed to correct its “inflated” 2015 net profit forecasts, but said shareholders may not have suffered any loss flowing from the breaches, in a monumental decision that also found investors do not always need to prove direct reliance on misrepresentations in claiming damages in class actions.