Goldman Ismail Helps AbbVie Secure Appellate Victory

Goldman Ismail, together with Kirkland and Ellis LLP, recently secured a victory for AbbVie in the Appellate Court of Illinois. The Court affirmed summary judgment for AbbVie in Elliott Associates L.P. et al. v AbbVie Inc. Several hedge funds brought securities fraud claims against AbbVie related to its attempted $55 billion merger with Shire plc. The hedge funds claimed they “suffered substantial damages” in 2014 when AbbVie announced its plans to abandon the merger. After six years of protracted litigation, including nearly 100 depositions, the Appellate Court rejected the hedge funds’ claims and held that the statements at issue were not fraudulent and were instead non-actionable opinions. The Court’s decision is here.

A Goldman Ismail team (Tarek Ismail, Alan Littmann, Andrew Rima, Betsy Farrington, and Symone Shinton) partnered with co-counsel Kirkland & Ellis LLP to secure AbbVie’s victory. The Kirkland team included Gabor Balassa, Andrew Kassof, and Jim Hurst.