Morgan Stanley Wins Dismissal of Antitrust Suit

On October 1, 2021, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York dismissed consolidated antitrust suits brought by the parent company of an electronic stock‑loan trading platform, SL‑x IP S.á.r.l., and its subsidiaries, against Cravath client Morgan Stanley, banks Merrill Lynch, Credit Suisse, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan and UBS, and EquiLend, a provider of electronic stock lending services.

SL‑x alleged its trading platform would have modernized the stock‑loan industry absent a conspiracy by the defendant banks to boycott SL‑x and instead trade stock loans through EquiLend, which purchased SL‑x’s intellectual property when SL‑x decommissioned its platform. Judge Richard A. Sullivan granted the defendants’ joint motion to dismiss claims brought by parent company SL‑x IP S.á.r.l. for lack of Article III standing because it neither owned the relevant IP nor operated the purportedly boycotted business, and the real parties in interest with standing to litigate the claims—the previously‑dissolved subsidiaries—did not exist at the time of filing suit. The court also dismissed the federal and state antitrust claims brought by the revived subsidiaries after concluding the four‑year statute of limitations applicable for Sherman Act and Donnelly Act claims had expired and the subsidiaries failed to adequately allege the defendants fraudulently concealed the purported conspiracy as necessary to toll the statute of limitations. The court declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the plaintiffs’ remaining state law claims.

The Cravath team was led by partners Daniel Slifkin, Michael A. Paskin, Damaris Hernández and Lauren M. Rosenberg.

The case is SL‑x IP S.Á.R.L. v. Bank of Am. Corp., No. 1:18‑cv‑10179‑RJS (S.D.N.Y.).