In the ongoing Brundle v. Wilmington Trust ESOP saga, which is now in the appeals stage, the Department of Labor recently filed an amicus brief in support of the district court’s $29.8 million judgment against the ESOP trustee. The case arose out of a plan participant’s claim that the ESOP trustee breached its fiduciary duties to the plan by causing the ESOP to pay more than fair market value for the employer’s stock. Read more >>

A recent ESOP decision involving allegations of breach of fiduciary duty and engaging in a prohibited transaction turned on whether the ESOP trustee’s financial advisor had performed proper due diligence and issued defensible fairness and valuation analyses. Read more >>