Seven years ago this week, in Roam-Tel Partners v. AT&T Mobility, C.A. 5745-VCS (Del. Ch. Dec. 17, 2010), then-Vice Chancellor Strine held that in a short-form merger, a stockholder can revoke its prior waiver of its appraisal rights within the twenty-day statutory election period, absent any prejudice to the corporation. In that case, the
Eight years ago today, in DiRienzo v. Steel Partners Holdings L.P., No. 4506-CC (Del. Ch. Dec. 8, 2009), Chancellor Chandler reaffirmed the principle that the record holder requirements of Section 262(a) demand strict compliance.
The Chancery Court dismissed an appraisal petition on grounds that the appraisal demand was not made by a record holder
The New York Law Journal recently ran an article, Looking Beyond Delaware: Exercising Shareholder Appraisal Rights in N.Y. [via ALM], which analyzes the New York appraisal statute and observes that while appraisal litigation has remained underutilized outside of Delaware, it is possible that with the uptick in Delaware appraisal New York will see more appraisal
In his second appraisal decision in as many months, Chancellor Bouchard faced the novel question of whether the Chancery Court can approve a settlement between the surviving company and certain non-appearing dissenters, who had never themselves filed or joined in an appraisal petition, if the terms of that settlement are unavailable to all of the
The Chancery Court granted summary judgment in favor of Dell against a number of stockholders who duly noticed their appraisal demands but whose stock certificates had been retitled before the effective date of the merger to their own custodians’ nominees. As is typical for an appraisal challenge, DTC certificated the dissenting stockholders’ shares into the
As reported in USAToday, T. Rowe Price, the third largest shareholder in Dell, Inc., has been pursuing an appraisal case to recover more than the $13.75 per share merger price. However, it has now come to light that T. Rowe actually voted “for” the 2013 take-private deal by the company’s founder, thus threatening its
In two separate rulings on January 5, 2015 — In re Appraisal of Ancestry.com., Inc., and Merion Capital LP v. BMC Software, Inc., both by Vice Chancellor Glasscock — the Delaware Chancery Court reaffirmed the legitimacy of the appraisal arbitrage strategy and refused to impose share-tracing requirements or other obligations on the beneficial stockholder, continuing
An interesting question first addressed many years ago has just resurfaced: can a shareholder seek appraisal rights for shares it acquires after the merger is announced and even after the record date that is set for voting on whether to approve the proposed M&A transaction? Historically the Delaware court said yes, subject to certain other