Altaba Announces Class Action Settlement of $47m

Techie Talks September 18, 2018

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Altaba Announces Class Action Settlement of $47m: In a letter to its shareholders, Altaba Inc. (Formerly Yahoo!) has just announced that it has also sold the remaining shares of the Yahoo Japan and they have successfully reached a settlement agreement in the class action lawsuit that is related to the 2014 Yahoo data breach.

In March of this year, as a result of a very huge breaches that took place between 2013 to 2016 at Yahoo, US District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California, denied Verizon’s attempts to dismiss claims of the Yahoo’s negligence and breach of the contract, according to the Reuters.

The legal woes that resulting from the class of action suit have today to come to a close. “We are also pleased to announce the today that we have reach an agreement in the principal (Subject to court approval) to settle the consumer class action litigation related to the Yahoo data breach,” Thomas J. McInerney, CEO at Altaba Inc., wrote.

“We have also received the final court approval of the securities class action settlement, and we have negotiated an agreement to settle the shareholder derivative litigation (subject to court approval). We estimate that the Company will incur an incremental net $47 million in the litigation settlement expenses to resolve all three cases. Together, these developments mark a significant milestone in cleaning up our contingent liabilities related to the Yahoo data breach.”

This settlement has come to announcement after 10 days the plaintiffs and the defendants were engaged in a second day of the mediation with Honorable Daniel Weinstein. As part of the agreement, the court has 45 days to approve the terms of the settlement.

“In the mean time, the parties in this action jointly and respectfully request the Court to stay this litigation in its entirety to allow the parties to focus their efforts entirely on finalizing the settlement and to avoid any unnecessary waste of judicial resources,” John Yanchunis of Morgan & Morgan, lead counsel for the plaintiffs, and Ann Marie Mortimer of Hunton Andrews Kurth, LLP, attorney for the defendants wrote in a September 14 filing.

The shareholders were also informed that the company proceeds will be again used to repurchase the stock, according to the McInerney. He wrote, “Today we are announcing a new share repurchase authorization of %5.75 billion.”