Holmes v. Grubman
| Citation | 568 F.3d 329 |
| Decision Date | 03 June 2009 |
| Docket Number | Docket No. 06-5246-cv. |
| Parties | William K. HOLMES, Holmes Capital, LLC, Brew Dog, LLC, Bimini Star, LLC, and EBH Investments Co., LLC, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Jack GRUBMAN and Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. f/k/ a Smith Barney Co., Inc., Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (2nd Circuit) |
Rosemary S. Armstrong (Joseph J. Burton, on the brief), Burton & Armstrong, LLP, Atlanta, GA, for Plaintiffs-Appellants William K. Holmes, Holmes Capital, LLC, Brew Dog, LLC, Bimini Star, LLC, and EBH Investments Co., LLC.
Walter Rieman (Brad S. Karp, Eric S. Goldstein, Susanna Buergel, on the brief), Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, New York, NY, for Defendants-Appellees Jack Grubman and Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. f/k/a Smith Barney Co., Inc.
Before: CABRANES and WALKER, Circuit Judges.*
This case, which was filed in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Georgia but consolidated with the WorldCom Securities Litigation in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York (Denise Cote, Judge), presents several issues, four of which encompass questions of Georgia law. Plaintiffs-appellants, William K. Holmes and four entities under his control (collectively, "Holmes" or "plaintiffs"), once held a substantial number of shares in WorldCom, the now-defunct telecommunications giant, and allegedly refrained from selling those shares on the advice of their brokerage firm, defendants-appellees Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. ("CitiGroup"), then Salomon Smith Barney & Co., Inc. ("SSB"), and Jack Grubman, an SSB financial analyst.1 Holmes's decision, allegedly induced by defendants fraudulent misrepresentations, resulted in the financial demise of Holmes and the entities.
We consider whether the District Court erred in (1) denying plaintiffs' untimely motion to amend their complaint or (2) dismissing plaintiffs' claim under Georgia's "blue sky" law2 on the grounds that plaintiffs failed to state a claim under the relevant statute. Further, resolution of this appeal requires us to consider whether (3) Georgia courts would recognize plaintiffs' claims of fraud based on defendants' alleged intent to cause plaintiffs to refrain from selling securities, (4) plaintiffs have adequately pleaded proximate cause under Georgia law, and (5) SSB owed plaintiffs a fiduciary duty under Georgia law. We affirm the judgment of the District Court with respect to the first two of these five issues. Because the state's highest court has not directly addressed the remaining issues and because we are unable to predict with certainty how the court would rule on them in the instant case, we certify the final three questions to the Supreme Court of Georgia.
Where, as here, we consider a District Court's dismissal of a complaint pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), we "accept[] all factual allegations in the complaint as true." Burch v. Pioneer Credit Recovery, Inc., 551 F.3d 122, 124 (2d Cir.2008) (internal quotation marks omitted).
In 1998, plaintiffs owned approximately 2.1 million shares of WorldCom stock. Holmes alleges that on June 25, 1999, he ordered his SSB broker to sell all of his WorldCom stock. At that time, WorldCom stock was trading at approximately $92.00 per share. According to Holmes, the broker advised him not to sell the stock and observed that recent research reports by Jack Grubman had taken a favorable view of WorldCom. Holmes believed that the advice given by Grubman in his reports was reliable because, as Holmes put it, Grubman's reputation for excellence in analysis of telecommunications securities imbued him with "quasicelebrity status" as a "swashbuckling deal broker" who "knew `everyone who was anyone' in the telecom sector ... including [WorldCom CEO Bernard] Ebbers." Joint Appendix ("J.A.") at 1848 (3d. Am. Comp. ¶ 153).
Based on the broker's advice and Grubman's reports, Holmes not only refrained from selling the WorldCom stock, but also purchased additional shares as the price per share declined. In October 2000, Holmes was forced to sell his WorldCom stock so that his SSB account would satisfy SSB's minimum balance requirement. According to Holmes, these "margin call" sales resulted in losses of nearly $200 million. The Holmes entities then filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Georgia.
In June 2003, plaintiffs brought the instant action seeking compensatory and punitive damages under Georgia law in the same Bankruptcy Court as an adversary proceeding related to the Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding. Shortly thereafter, plaintiffs filed an amended complaint alleging, among other things, that SSB and Grubman made negligent and fraudulent misrepresentations designed to induce them to purchase and to refrain from selling WorldCom securities. The gravamen of this compliant was that defendants operated under a conflict of interest, commencing in April 1998, when SSB began to provide underwriting services to WorldCom at the same time that Grubman made purportedly objective investment recommendations in his reports to investors such as Holmes. Holmes alleged that SSB knew that WorldCom stock was grossly overvalued but nevertheless promoted it to him and other account holders in order to secure WorldCom's investment banking business.
The case was transferred to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York and consolidated, for pre-trial purposes, in the multi-district WorldCom Securities Litigation. See Holmes v. Grubman (In re WorldCom, Inc. Sec. Litig.), No. 02 Civ. 3288, 2006 WL 751382, at *1 (S.D.N.Y. Mar. 24, 2006) ("Holmes I" or "March 2006 Opinion"). After the transfer, Holmes filed a second amended complaint and defendants moved to dismiss. On March 24, 2006, the District Court granted defendants' motion on the grounds that (1) under Georgia tort law, plaintiffs cannot recover damages arising from their decision to hold securities instead of selling them, id. at *2; (2) plaintiffs failed to identify the statutory provision giving rise to their securities claim under Georgia's securities laws, id. at *3; and (3) plaintiffs failed to plead adequately their breach of contract claim, id. The District Court, sua sponte, permitted plaintiffs to file a third amended complaint, with the following instructions:
To the extent [plaintiffs] wish to pursue a claim under Georgia's [blue sky law], they must identify the specific provision they seek to enforce. To the extent they believe they can file a breach of contract claim that is consistent with the factual assertions in their pleading, they must identify the provision of the contract that was breached. They should address to the extent that they were able to do so the other deficiencies in the Complaint to which the defendants refer in their motion papers since they will be given no further opportunity to amend their pleading to cure those deficiencies.
Id. at *3 (emphasis added).
Plaintiffs filed a third amended complaint, alleging that defendants recommended that investors purchase WorldCom stock solely as a means to retain WorldCom's investment banking business and despite defendants' knowledge of WorldCom's weak prospects. See Holmes v. Grubman (In re WorldCom, Inc. Sec. Litig.), 456 F.Supp.2d 508, 511 (S.D.N.Y. 2006) ("Holmes II"). The third amended complaint contained the following seven causes of action: (1) fraudulent misrepresentation and omission of WorldCom's financial condition and the defendants' conflict of interest; (2) breach of fiduciary duty; (3) negligent misrepresentation for misleading information and omissions; (4) negligence in making disclosures; (5) violation of Georgia's blue sky laws, as codified at section 10-5-12 of the Annotated Georgia Code; (6) breach of contract; and (7) a "holder" claim—i.e., one based on Holmes's decision, allegedly induced by SSB, to forbear the sale of WorldCom securities—solely to preserve the issue for appeal. Id. at 511-12 & n. 3. For the first time, plaintiffs alleged that defendants made fraudulent misrepresentations that induced plaintiffs to purchase WorldCom securities prior to June 25, 1999. Id. at 511.
Defendants moved to dismiss the third amended complaint for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). Granting defendants' motion, the District Court held that (1) the third amended complaint's inclusion of claims arising from pre-June 25 1999 purchases of WorldCom securities were new claims, untimely raised in the third amended complaint and unauthorized by the March 2006 Opinion, Holmes II, 456 F.Supp.2d at 513; (2) plaintiffs failed to plead proximate cause with respect to the fraud, negligence, and negligent misrepresentation claims because they did not provide "fair notice of any disclosure that could be said to have played a role in the decline in WorldCom's stock price and that was concealed by the defendants' fraud or negligence," id. at 515;3 (3) the defendants did not owe plaintiffs a fiduciary duty under Georgia law, id. at 517-18; (4) the complaint's invocation of Georgia's blue sky law, "Title 10, Chapter 5, Section 12 of the Official Code of Georgia"—which contains twenty-three different prohibitions— did not satisfy the March 2006 Opinion's requirement that plaintiffs plead a violation of a specific provision of the statute, id. at 518; and (5) plaintiffs would not be given yet another opportunity to re-plead the claim, id. Also, the District Court dismissed again plaintiffs' (6) breach of contract claim and (7) "holder" claim. Id. at 519.
This appeal followed.
Before this Court, plaintiffs contend that the District Court erred in (1) denying them leave to amend their complaint to include claims based on their purchases of WorldCom securities prior to June 25, 1999, and (2) in dismissing plaintiffs' blue...
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