Once again, there are demands to reform corporate litigation. (See, e.g., Kevin LaCroix, “Time for Another Round of Securities Class Action Litigation Reform,” The D&O Diary, Oct. 23, 2018.) But once again, the Delaware courts are leading the way to cure the problems that litigation critics complain of most. Recent Delaware Court of Chancery decisions are yet another example of that leadership. We begin to show how that is being done, by outlining the perceived problems.

The critics focus on two types of corporation litigation they claim are serious problems: so-called merger objection lawsuits; and event-driven securities litigation. The principal objection to merger objection lawsuits is that they only allege a proposed merger is improper because the proxy statement asking for stockholders’ approval is inadequate, the alleged problem is then “cured” by defendants’ immaterial supplemental disclosures and the case is dismissed after the plaintiffs lawyers are paid off with a substantial fee. That seems to be tolerating a strike lawsuit that really accomplished nothing but a fee for the lawyers.