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In Walsh v. Bowers, No. 1:18-cv-00155-SOM-WRP (D.C. Hawaii, September 17, 2021), a district court decisively ruled in favor of the trustee and the board of directors of the ESOP company Bowers+Kubota in an ESOP valuation case.

In Fish v. GreatBanc Trust Company, No. 09 C-1668 (D.C. N. Ill. Sept. 1, 2016), a district court ruled in favor of the defendants, who included GreatBanc and members of the Antioch Company board and family who previously owned stock outside of the ESOP.

A U.S. Court of Appeals has ruled that an ESOP trustee cannot generally be held liable for failing to diversify ESOP holdings out of company stock, even if such diversification would have been a more prudent course of investment. The case (Kuper v. Iovenko, CA 6, No.

A district court in Illinois granted summary judgment in favor of Holden Industries, rejecting claims by a former ESOP participant, which were based on his reading of the summary plan description (SPD).

ESOPs are legally intended to be plans that are primarily invested in employer stock. This does not exempt their fiduciaries, however, from the prudence requirement that any particular decision to buy employer stock must be a financially sound one.

In Fox v. Herzog, Heine, and Geduld, Inc., No. 01-CV-1827 (D.N.J., 12/27/05), a district court ruled that employees of Merrill Lynch could participate in the allocation of suspense account shares previously held in the Herzog, Heine, and Gedlud (HHG) ESOP after Merrill Lynch acquired HHG.

In a decision that seems to provide considerable leeway for ESOP fiduciaries to hold onto employer stock even in the face of information that seems to argue for selling shares, a U.S.

The United States Court of Federal Claims supported an interpretation of stock ownership requirements by the Small Business Administration that resulted in an ESOP company losing its status as a service-disabled veteran-owned (SDVO) small business.

In a potentially important ruling, a district court has dismissed a case against defendants at Inland Fresh Seafood Company because plaintiffs did not first exhaust the remedies for complaints provided by the plan.

The recent spate of "stock drop" cases has focused mostly on 401(k) plans, but some of the companies had ESOPs as well. Courts have generally adopted the Moench v. Robertson doctrine that investments in company stock can be presumed to be prudent unless the company is in serious difficulty.