Court of Chancery Addresses Whether a Minority Stockholder Constitutes a Controlling Stockholder at Motion to Dismiss Stage in Recent M&A Cases

February 17, 2015

Publication| Corporate Transactions| Corporate & Chancery Litigation

In four opinions issued within three months of one another, four different members of the Delaware Court of Chancery have considered, at the motion to dismiss procedural stage, whether allegations in a complaint were sufficient to establish that a minority stockholder constituted a controlling stockholder under Delaware law. In In re KKR Financial Holdings LLC Shareholder Litigation, 101 A.3d 980 (Del. Ch. 2014), In re Crimson Exploration Inc. Stockholder Litigation, 2014 WL 5449419 (Del. Ch. Oct. 24, 2014), and In re Sanchez Energy Derivative Litigation, 2014 WL 6673895 (Del. Ch. Nov. 25, 2014), the Court concluded that the minority stockholder at issue did not constitute a controlling stockholder, while in In re Zhongpin Inc. Stockholders Litigation, 2014 WL 6735457 (Del. Ch. Nov. 26, 2014), the Court found that allegations that a minority stockholder controlled a company and its board of directors were sufficient to withstand a motion to dismiss.

KKR Financial involved a suit challenging the acquisition of KKR Financial Holdings LLC (“KFN”) by KKR & Co. L.P. (“KKR”). The Court held that KKR, which owned less than 1% of KFN’s stock, was not a controlling stockholder despite allegations that a KKR affiliate managed the day-to-day business of KFN and that KFN was used primarily as a public vehicle for financing KKR-sponsored transactions. In dismissing the complaint, the Court focused on whether KKR had the ability to control the board of directors of KFN and found that the complaint lacked any allegation that KKR had a contractual right to appoint members of the board of directors, that KKR dictated any specific course of action to the board of directors, or that KKR prevented the members of the board of directors from exercising their judgment in determining whether or not to approve the merger with KKR. Accordingly, the Court held that the plaintiffs had failed to demonstrate that it was reasonably conceivable that KKR was a controlling stockholder under Delaware law and dismissed the complaint.

In Crimson Exploration, the plaintiffs alleged that Oaktree Capital Management and its affiliates (“Oaktree”) collectively controlled Crimson Exploration Inc. (“Crimson”) based on Oaktree’s ownership of 33.7% of Crimson’s voting stock, its status as a large creditor of Crimson and its designation of a majority of Crimson’s directors and senior management (including three directors employed by Oaktree). After reviewing relevant Delaware precedent, the Court explained that a minority stockholder will not be considered a controlling stockholder unless the minority stockholder actually controls the board’s decisions about the challenged transaction. The Court then found that the complaint had failed to plead specific allegations that Oaktree controlled the actions of the board of directors during its negotiation of the merger. Thus, although the Court noted its hesitancy to conclude that the complaint’s other allegations could not conceivably state a claim that Oaktree was a controller, the Court ultimately decided that the plaintiffs’ complaint (which the Court characterized as supplying “little in the way of specific allegations of control”) nevertheless failed to show that Oaktree was conflicted as to the transaction or received some unique benefit from the transaction, and consequently failed to plead that the entire fairness standard applied to the transaction.

In Sanchez Energy, the Court examined the controller issue in the context of a derivative action governed by the stricter pleading requirements of Court of Chancery Rule 23.1. The Plaintiffs argued that the failure to make a demand on the board of directors of Sanchez Energy Company should be excused because two of the company’s co-founders and the collective owners of 21.5% of its stock, A.R. Sanchez Jr. (the company’s board chairman) and his son A.R. Sanchez III (the company’s chief executive officer), were controlling stockholders who exercised direct managerial control over the company, and the transaction at issue involved another company in which they were investors. While the plaintiffs had alleged that the Sanchezes directed the company’s management, the Court found that they did not exercise greater control over the company than that typical of a chief executive officer. Further, citing KKR Financial and Crimson Exploration, the Court held that, absent particularized allegations that the Sanchezes controlled the decisions of the board of directors with respect to the challenged transaction, the plaintiffs failed to plead sufficiently that the Sanchezes were controlling stockholders under Delaware law.

In contrast to KKR Financial, Crimson Exploration and Sanchez Energy, the Court in Zhongpin denied a motion to dismiss, finding that the plaintiffs had sufficiently pleaded indicia of domination to raise an inference that Xianfu Zhu, the founder of Zhongpin Inc. (“Zhongpin”), was a controlling stockholder under Delaware law. Zhu held 17.3% of the outstanding voting stock of Zhongpin and was also Zhongpin’s chairman of the board and chief executive officer. The plaintiffs, former stockholders of Zhongpin, challenged a going-private transaction in which Zhu acquired all of the company’s outstanding stock, alleging that Zhu was a controlling stockholder that stood on both sides of the transaction. Unlike in Sanchez Energy, the Court determined that the plaintiffs’ allegations (gleaned primarily from the company’s own disclosures in a Form 10-K filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission) supported an inference that Zhu exercised significantly more power over Zhongpin than would be expected of a chief executive officer and 17% stockholder. In addition to crediting the plaintiffs’ argument that the alleged controller possessed active control over Zhongpin’s day-to-day operations, the Court found that the complaint raised an inference that Zhu possessed latent control over Zhongpin through his stock ownership. The Court noted that disclosure in the company’s 10-K cited by the plaintiffs implied that Zhu could exercise significant influence over stockholder approvals for the election of directors, mergers and acquisitions, and amendments to the company’s bylaws.

In addition, in Zhongpin and another controlling stockholder case recently decided by the Court, In re Cornerstone Therapeutics Inc. Stockholder Litigation, 2014 WL 4418169 (Del. Ch. Sept. 10, 2014), a separate issue arose as to whether, assuming entire fairness review applied to claims against a controlling stockholder, claims against the disinterested directors could nevertheless be dismissed at the pleading stage because they were exculpated from personal liability under a company’s certificate of incorporation. The disinterested directors in both cases argued that in the absence of any allegations raising an inference that they breached any non-exculpated duty, the exculpation provision in the company’s certificate of incorporation mandated dismissal even if the Court concluded that entire fairness was the operative standard of review. In both Cornerstone and Zhongpin, the Court held that, despite the persuasive force of the argument, precedent directs that the Court must await a developed post-trial record before determining the liability of the directors. The Delaware Supreme Court has accepted interlocutory appeals in both Cornerstone and Zhongpin, and the plaintiffs in both KKR Financial and Sanchez Energy are pursuing appeals from the Court of Chancery’s final judgments dismissing their claims.

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