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Our presenters will provide an overview of the material developments and trends that emerged during the 2025 proxy season with an outlook what we can expect through the rest of the year.

On July 24, 2025, the two largest U.S. proxy advisory firms—Glass, Lewis & Co. (“Glass Lewis”) and Institutional Shareholder Services Inc. (“ISS”)—each separately filed suit against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas challenging recently enacted Texas Senate Bill 2337 (“S.B. 2337”).

The Delaware Supreme Court’s June 17, 2025 decision in In re Columbia Pipeline Group Merger Litigation reversed a $199 million damages award against TC Energy for aiding and abetting breaches by fiduciaries of Columbia Pipeline Group relating to TC Energy’s acquisition of Columbia Pipeline.

In the latest instance of a private equity seller vindicating contractual rights in the Delaware Court of Chancery, on April 30, Vice Chancellor Lori W. Will rejected attempts by minority LLC members in urgent care provider CityMD to avoid the clear terms of their LLC agreement by urging the court to impose fiduciary duty-type obligations on the majority owner and seller, Warburg Pincus, LLC and funds it controls (“WP Investors”).

Delaware amended the Delaware General Corporation Law (the “DGCL”) to create safe harbors for transactions involving directors, officers and controlling stockholders and to limit both the documents subject to and the purposes of books and records requests.

In a move that perhaps comes as no surprise, on March 27, 2025, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC” or “the Commission”) issued Press Release 2025-58 announcing it had voted to end its defense of its climate-related disclosures rules (The Enhancement and Standardization of Climate-Related Disclosures for Investors).

In early March 2024, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) finalized its climate-related disclosures rule (The Enhancement and Standardization of Climate-Related Disclosures for Investors) (the “Final Rule”).

On January 7, 2025, Vice Chancellor Glasscock issued a 68-page post-trial decision in Manti Holdings, LLC v. The Carlyle Group Inc., in which he rejected plaintiffs’ claims of breach of fiduciary duty in connection with the sale of Authentix Acquisition Company, Inc. (“Authentix” or the “Company”) to private equity firm Blue Water Energy LLP (“BWE”) in September 2017.

On November 14, 2024, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed the SEC’s ability to intervene in shareholder proposals under Rule 14a-8 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (“Rule 14a-8 Proposals”).

On November 8, 2024, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) announced a settled enforcement action (the “SEC Order”) against Invesco Advisers, Inc. (“Invesco”), an investment advisory firm, for making misleading statements concerning the company-wide percentage of assets under management (“AUM”) that integrated environmental, social and governance (“ESG”) factors in investment decisions.

On September 1, 2024, a notable change occurred in the Texas legal landscape with the official launch of the new Texas Business Court. Created through House Bill 19, which was signed into law on June 9, 2023, these 11 civil courts aim to provide a specialized venue for trials, specifically those resolving significant, complex commercial disputes. They also seek to streamline cases away from the burdened district courts.

In recent months, the Delaware Court of Chancery has decided four significant cases regarding merger agreement earnout provisions.