Recovered £267 million on behalf of a group of institutional investors who participated in the Group Litigation Order (GLO) proceedings against the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS). The entire GLO settled for approximately £900 million. At the time it was resolved, the settlement of the GLO was the largest securities settlement in UK history.
Working with UK counsel, we represented a group of institutional investors in a UK case alleging that RBS misled investors about its exposure to subprime-related assets, collateralized debt obligations, and the inflated value of its assets in connection with a £13 billion Rights Offering that was completed in June 2008. Just months later, in September 2008, RBS failed and had to be bailed out by the UK government. Investors who purchased shares in the Rights Offering lost nearly 90 percent of the value of that investment. Our clients, and investors who were part of other investors groups with which we worked closely, lost billions in connection with the Rights Offering purchases and subsequent RBS collapse. RBS’s write-downs and reported full-year net loss for 2008, represented the largest loss ever for a UK-based company and the largest for any commercial bank in the world. After the initial September 2008 bailout, the UK government bailed out RBS on two subsequent occasions, becoming an 82% shareholder of the company.