With Vigour and Zeal

Though it actually warrants far larger exposure (and scrutiny) than given here now, for now just two notes on proceedings involving Vivendi Universal SA, as it then was (Vivendi SA; Euronext: VIV), namely on the SEC settlement and the class certification in the securities action.

The deadline to file your claim to share in the $51 million SEC settlement is in two days, Tuesday 12 June. See the Vivendi SEC Settlement website for the notice, proof of claim form and more information and to file your claim online. (Note that the eleven countries on the home page of the site seem to indicate language only. The eligibility criteria do not include requirements of citizenship or exchange of purchase.)

Ross Dixon & Bell LLP’s D&O Liability alert of 28 March has a review of the class certification, the court having certified the class as purchasers of the United States, France, England and the Netherlands. “Recognition in England, Your Honour? Is that England the constituent country, or England and Wales together which share the same legal system under English law? Your Honour, are all citizens of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the sovereign state, included?” (In re Vivendi Universal SA Securities Litigation, No. 02-5571 (SDNY))

With thanks to Eric J. Belfi of Labaton Sucharow & Rudoff LLP for his submission of the class certification decision at the time and an update this week, earlier this week the review of the decision has been denied and so the class as certified remains. Also see the US Chamber of Commerce’s amicus brief, in which its affiliate the National Chamber Litigation Center argues that “there should be a virtual certainty of preclusive effect before a class including foreign members should ever be certified”.

What’s more: Steve W. Berman of Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP and James Quinney of Herbert Smith LLP give the only presentation on class actions at the International Litigation and Fraud conference in London, 26 and 27 June. Key note speaker is Mr Justice Langley of the Royal Courts of Justice. (programme with registration form or book online)

The main post on the settlement is still pending (see previous post), but with thanks to The Race to the Bottom, in the interim a third note.

Earlier this month, Lead Plaintiffs PSERS and SERS (represented by Lead Class Counsel Bernstein Liebhard & Lifshitz LLP) have filed two motions in opposition of the settlement in the original US case pending in New Jersey District Court, opposing the severance and dismissal of the opt-out plaintiffs’ claims and in support of enjoinder of Shell and the Opt-Out Plaintiffs from seeking approval of the settlement in the Amsterdam Court of Appeals.

Shell (Robertson Freilich Bruno & Cohen LLC) and the Opt-Out Plaintiffs (Grant & Eisenhofer PA) each have filed motions in response. The University of Denver Sturm College of Law’s Corporate Governance section (with which The Race to the Bottom is affiliated) offers all four motions.

What’s more: though this is of course the shortest of short notices and hot on the heels of the IBA/ABA’s European class action conference of last week in Rome, Global Pensions hosts a conference in London tomorrow on the same topic under the title Class Action Forum 2007. (programme) The speakers are predominantly from plaintiffs’ firms Berger & Montague PC, Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossmann LLP and Murray Frank & Sailer LLP.

One presentation of note is on the Shell settlement as case study presented by Gerard W.R. Fehrenbach, a senior adviser with pension fund PGGM, one of the Opt-Out Plaintiffs.

The International Bar Association and the American Bar Association present a conference on European class actions in Rome’s Grand Hotel Plaza on the 24th and 25th of May, next week. (programme including registration form)

The conference, entitled Class actions at a crossroads: Europe’s choice between its own and the American model, focuses on the current status and legislative developments of class and collective actions here and on comparison with the US model.

Key note speaker is Meglena Kuneva, European Commissioner for Consumers (invited) and other speakers, drawn from a mid-Atlantic pool of academics and practitioners, include:

• Elizabeth J. Cabraser (Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein LLP)
• Professor John C. Coffee (Columbia University School of Law)
• Patricia Hynes (Allen & Overy LLP)
• Judge John G. Koeltl (SDNY)
• Xavier Nyssen (Dechert LLP, Paris)
• Nicola Walter Palmieri (General Counsel, Parmalat SpA)
• Sherrie R. Savett (Berger & Montague PC)

WV&Z will be there to cover the event.