EBay CEO Meg Whitman, Chairman Pierre Omidyar and former vice president Jeffrey Skoll have agreed to pay $3 million to the auction site to settle a shareholder lawsuit that accused them of profiting from Initial Public Offerings ( IPO ) in breach of their fiduciary duties.
The dispute is one of many US suits that concern "spinning" – where investment banks offered the chance to buy allocations of shares in company flotations to top executives of their clients. The practice was common, and legal, until 2003.Omidyar, Whitman and Skoll were accused of personally profiting from shares being offered in start-ups by investment bank Goldman Sachs between 1999 and 2001. The lawsuit claimed they "flipped" the shares, selling them quickly – often within hours of the IPO – in order to make a substantial profit.EBay shareholders sued because they said that the eBay executives should not have used the allocations for personal gain; rather, they said shares should have been bought by eBay itself.Omidyar, Whitman and Skoll denied the allegations, but under the settlement, which still has to be approved by a Delaware court, they will pay $3.395 million to eBay. Goldman Sachs will also make a payment of $395,000.
Plans to launch a new digital NHS trust aimed at bringing down waiting lists and widening access to health services in England face significant safety and security concerns, an expert has warned.
Plans to reform cryptocurrency regulation in Dubai’s International Financial Centre (DIFC) will bring the financial free zone’s rules into alignment with international best practices, according to an expert.
We use cookies that are essential for our site to work. To improve our site, we would like to use additional cookies to help us understand how visitors use it, measure traffic to our site from social media platforms and to personalise your experience. Some of the cookies that we use are provided by third parties. To accept all cookies click ‘accept all’. To reject all optional cookies click ‘reject all’. To choose which optional cookies to allow click ‘cookie settings’. This tool uses a cookie to remember your choices.
Please visit our cookie policy for more information.
We are processing your request. \n Thank you for your patience.An error occurred. This could be due to inactivity on the page - please try again.
