A judge gave final approval Tuesday to a $586 million settlement of long-running litigation over the allocation of initial public offerings during the Internet boom of the late 1990s.
In an order made public Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Shira A. Scheindlin in Manhattan approved the settlement, which resolved 309 cases.
The underwriters included more than a dozen of the biggest banking companies on Wall Street, including units of Credit Suisse Group, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch & Co., Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Citigroup Inc.
Beginning in 2001, thousands of investors filed lawsuits seeking class-action status and naming 55 underwriters, more than 300 issuers and hundreds of corporate officers as defendants. These suits were consolidated into more than 300 cases.
Scheindlin certified six focus cases in 2004 in hopes of providing a basis for handling the proposed IPO class actions.
