Summary of Trend Cases: An Excerpt from Securities Class Action Filings—2021 Midyear Assessment
Thursday, July 29, 2021

Securities Class Action Filings—2021 Midyear Assessment

Executive Summary

Overall filing activity dropped considerably in the first half of 2021, falling to 112 filings from 150 filings in the second half of 2020. This decline was largely driven by a substantial reduction in the number of M&A class actions and federal and state 1933 Act filings, although core filings with Section 10(b) allegations were also down modestly.

Filings in the first half of 2021 were generally smaller, resulting in lower MDL and DDL indices. DDL fell 50% from $162 billion in 2020 H2 to $80 billion in 2021 H1. Similarly, MDL fell 64% from $991 billion in 2020 H2 to $361 billion in 2021 H1.

Special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) IPOs have continued to explode. Filings against SPAC-related entities increased sharply in the first half of 2021. There were also 10 filings related to COVID-19, largely concentrated in the first four months of the year.

Trending Cases and Statistics

This figure highlights recent trends that have appeared in core filing activity.

  • All federal SPAC M&A filings in 2019 and 2020, except one, were filed before the closing date of the SPAC transaction. The median filing lag of federal M&A SPAC actions indicates that these filings typically took place a month and a half before the closing date of the De-SPAC Transaction.

 

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