In a boost to securities class actions, the High Court has ruled that directors of collapsed companies can be subjected to public examination by shareholders wanting to bring civil proceedings.
From a lengthy committal hearing challenging the ACCC’s investigatory techniques to repeated attacks on the prosecution’s indictment, an indefatigable team of barristers and lawyers across eight law firms helped bring an end to the four-year long pursuit of criminal cartel charges against three banks and six individuals over a $2.8 billion ANZ share placement.
The CDPP’s decision to drop all criminal cartel charges against two banks and four individuals in a “test case” over a $2.5 billion ANZ share placement shows the ACCC “lacks expertise and objectivity” on the financial markets and should leave them to ASIC to regulate, according to one of the former accused.
In a stunning reversal, the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecution has dropped all criminal cartel charges against two investment banks and four individuals in relation to a $2.5 billion ANZ share placement, four years after the charges were brought following an allegedly questionable investigation by the ACCC.
A case before the High Court could have major implications for company directors, giving shareholders in class actions the power to drag them before court for public examination.
The law firms and barristers who defended former Dick Smith directors in sprawling litigation over the failure of the electronics retailer earned close to $68 million in fees, a court has heard.
Last year brought economic growth and success for law firms, but 2021 was not only marked with good news. A slew of law firms were dragged into litigation by disgruntled ex-clients, with some paying out millions of dollars to resolve lawsuits accusing them of giving bad advice.
Victorian aged care homes accused of “major failures” during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic have lost their bid to declass claims of neglect brought in two class actions on behalf of residents and their grieving families.
National Australia Bank and HSBC should be “jointly and severally liable” to pay a portion of the costs of a failed case brought by Dick Smith’s receivers against the company’s former directors because the banks stood to gain financially if the lawsuit was successful, the NSW Supreme Court has heard.
A senior ACCC officer has been grilled on whether staff training on criminal cartel investigations was “inadequate” while the competition regulator ran a cartel probe into ANZ’s $2.5 billion share placement in 2016.