Recent Trends in US Mergers and Acquisitions Litigation

Kenneth Thompson, Senior Vice President and Global Chief Legal Officer, LexisNexis, USA

In 2010 mergers and acquisitions (‘M&A’) activity rebounded from recent lows with U.S. activity up 16.3% in 2010 over 2009. With this rebound came a number of new new structural developments, which generated a number of M&A-related caselaw developments. When combined with a wave of decisions arising from mid-crisis transactions, 2010 was an active year for M&A caselaw on a number of fronts. This article updates our article ‘Recent Trends in US Mergers and Acquisitions: Litigation and Regulatory Actions’ published in the Spring, 2010 edition of the International In-house Counsel Journal , for cases decided during 2010.

Ken Thompson is the Global Chief Legal Officer and Senior Vice President for LexisNexis Legal & Professional. He is a member of the Management Committee and the principal legal advisor to the Global CEO. Ken joined LexisNexis in 2001 after 15 years of private practice, and he is admitted in Ohio and Kentucky as well as to the U.S. Supreme Court, the U. S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, and the U.S. Tax Court. Ken is based in Cincinnati, Ohio and is a member of the International, American, Ohio, Kentucky and Cincinnati Bar Associations. He is currently the co-chair of Corporate Social Responsibility Committee of the International Bar Association and is a member of the Corporate Pro Bono Advisory Board, a pro bono partnership between ACC and PBI. Ken frequently speaks on a range of legal issues, including best practices for in-house attorneys, intellectual property, acquisitions and divestitures, corporate responsibility and corporate pro bono.

LexisNexis® is a leading global provider of content-enabled workflow solutions designed specifically for professionals in the legal, risk management, corporate, government, law enforcement, accounting, and academic markets. LexisNexis originally pioneered online information with its Lexis® and Nexis® services. A member of Reed Elsevier, LexisNexis serves customers in more than 100 countries with more than 15,000 employees worldwide.