The right of a stockholder of a Delaware corporation to inspect the books and records of the company is codified in Section 220 of the Delaware General Corporation Law. In recent years, and for a number of reasons, stockholders have been exercising this inspection right in ever increasing numbers (I have four clients addressing demands to inspect books and records as I write). A recent decision of the Court of Chancery (Juul Labs, Inc. v. Grove, C.A. No. 2020-0005-JTL) is worth highlighting–less for the substantive law related to Section 220 inspections of books and records and more its discussion of certain “gatekeeping” matters related to litigation to enforce these stockholder inspection rights.
The noteworthy holdings and outcomes in the Juul Labs decision are the following:
Because Juul Labs is a Delaware corporation, and a demand by a stockholder to inspect the books and records of a corporation are a matter of internal affairs for that entity, the stockholder could not use a similar California statute (even though Juul’s principal place of business is in California) as a basis upon which to demand the inspection of books and records;
A stockholder of a Delaware corporation must look solely to 8 Del. C. Sec. 220 for its statutory rights to inspect the books and records of a Delaware corporation in which they own shares; and
The court left open the question whether a stockholder of a Delaware corporation can contractually waive the statutory rights to inspection of books and records granted by Section 220.
Thus, while it is clear that Delaware corporations and their legal advisors can take greater comfort that disputes over stockholder access to corporate books and records can and will be heard in Delaware, the broader question of whether Delaware corporations can affirmatively contract with their stockholders to limit or obviate such inspection rights remains to be answered.
The minutes of corporate board meetings are, candidly, too often treated as an afterthought. This can lead to the official records being deemed not much of a record at all when later reviewed. Indeed, a reviewing court might even draw certain inferences based on what it finds, or does not find, in the minutes. I have discussed in this blog several times (here and here) certain nuances that go into the craft that is drafting a set of board minutes that properly memorialize the directors’ fealty to their roles as fiduciaries.
A recent opinion from the Court of Chancery demonstrates why, even at the time of setting the agenda for a board meeting, the corporate secretary should be cognizant of how that meeting will be memorialized in the corporate books and records. In an April 27, 2020, Memorandum Opinion in Hughes v. Hu, et al., C.A. No. 2019-0112-JTL, the Vice Chancellor drew certain plaintiff-friendly, pleadings-stage inferences in ruling on a motion to dismiss based on what was–and more importantly, what was not–included in the corporate board minutes regarding the topics in dispute (this Blog addressed the substantive matters in dispute here).
Critical to the court’s analysis was that prior to filing his complaint, the stockholder plaintiff had exercised his rights under Section 220 of the Delaware General Corporation Law to examine the books and records of the company. While the company had produced for inspection some books and records, the company stipulated that “any remaining materials requested by Plaintiff either do not exist or had been withheld on privilege grounds.” Thus, the court held that “if the Company failed to produce a document that it would reasonably be expected to possess if a particular event had occurred, then the plaintiff is entitled to a reasonable inference that the event did not occur.”
The court used that holding as the basis for drawing a number of inferences in the plaintiff’s favor based on what was not included in or with the corporate minutes. For instance, in multiple instances where the corporate minutes referred to a document or presentation that the directors purportedly reviewed, but where no copy of such document was produced for inspection with the minutes in the Section 220 proceedings, the court inferred that such materials did not exist, and therefore were not reviewed by the directors in carrying out their duties.
Moreover, the court also drew substantive inferences in plaintiff’s favor of the anticipated contents of documents referenced in the minutes but not appended to or presented with the such minutes. For instance, a set of minutes stated that the Audit Committee approved a “Policy of Related-Party Transactions Relating to JV Shareholder,” but no such policy had been presented with the corporate books and records for inspection by the stockholder. Thus, the court held: “It is reasonable to infer at the pleading stage that the policy did not place meaningful restrictions on management.”
Finally, it is worth noting that the court also highlighted in multiple places throughout the opinion the overall landscape presented by the corporate books and records. Specifically, the court noted relatively long gaps between meetings of the audit committee, the types of tasks the directors were purportedly undertaking at such meetings, and the actual length of the meetings themselves. For example, the court held it was “reasonable to infer that with the Audit Committee having not met for almost a year, there was no possible way that the Audit Committee could have fulfilled all of the responsibilities it was given under the Audit Committee Charter during a fifty-minute meeting.”
This opinion sheds light on the potential issues that might arise where corporate secretaries (or their counsel) have allowed the task of recording minutes of board meetings to become a mere footnote in the process of keeping accurate and meaningful corporate books and records. Based on this opinion, corporate record-keepers might:
In setting the agenda, give thought to how the meeting is going to flow with an eye to what the written minutes will ultimately record for history. That is, consider the order in which topics are discussed, the relative nature and materiality of each discussion topic, and the time reasonably necessary for the directors to effectively educate themselves about that matter, discuss it, and take action. The minutes should then reflect and record this flow of information, debate, consideration, and action by the directors.
Consider what documents or presentations will be provided to the directors for review and discussion and whether such materials should be provided to the directors in advance of the meeting.
Give thought to what materials–if any–will be appended to minutes in the official books and records of the company.
Drafting minutes that properly record the material events in the life of a board of directors is an art more than a science, but like the classical orders of ancient art and architecture, the gloss from judicial decisions of the courts can define characteristics of minutes that bring that art to life in ways that unmistakably portrays director behavior fully complying with fiduciary norms.
The Court of Chancery recently affirmed the long-standing principle that directors of Delaware corporations are vested with “virtually unfettered rights to inspect books and records” of the company they serve. Schnatter v. Papa John’s Int’l., Inc. C.A. No. 2018-0542-AGB (Jan. 15, 2019). The Chancellor went on to reiterate that a director of a Delaware corporation that makes a demand to inspect the books and records of the corporation pursuant to Sec. 220 of the Delaware General Corporation Law should generally have “access at least equal to that of the remainder of the board.”
Directors of a company make a prima facie case for a statutory inspection of books and records where they show that: (a) they are a director, (b) they have demanded an inspection, and (c) the demanded inspection has been refused. Upon that showing, the company will then bear the burden of proving that the director making the demand for inspection was for an improper purpose–that is, the director’s “motives are improper, or that they are in derogation of the interest of the corporation. . . .”
In United Technologies Corp. v. Treppel, No. 127, 2014 (Del. Dec. 23, 2014), the Supreme Court of Delaware reiterated the Court of Chancery’s wide discretion in placing reasonable conditions on a shareholder’s right to inspect corporate books and records pursuant to Section 220(c) of the DGCL. In this opinion, the Supreme Court highlights the statutory grant of discretion to the Court of Chancery to impose reasonable conditions on the inspection of corporate books and records, and discusses the body of precedent that applies that discretion.
A common condition to the exercise of the statutory inspection right is the entry into a reasonable protective order designed to protect the confidentiality of the Corporation’s information. Here, the company sought to add a provision to the protective order that would limit the stockholder’s ability to use the results of the inspection by requiring that “any claim, dispute, controversy or causes of action . . . arising out of, relating to, involving, or in connection with” be brought in a court in Delaware. Treppel refused to consent to such a provision and filed a Section 220 suit in the Court of Chancery. In a bench decision in January 2014, the Court of Chancery rejected the proposed condition and held that such a limitation “is not the type of restriction that 220(c) seeks to impose.” United Technologies appealed.
The Supreme Court reversed and remanded based upon its holding that because “the plain text of Sec. 220(c) provides broad power to the Court of Chancery to condition a books and records inspection, the court erred in determining that it lacked authority under the statute to impose the requested restriction.” The Supreme Court, however, declined the invitation to pass judgment on the particular clause at issue and remanded for the Court of Chancery to exercise its own discretion–in the first instance–in determining whether under the facts of this particular dispute such a condition might be warranted. The Supreme Court highlighted the following facts as being relevant to that determination: (1) the potential claims Treppel might file arise out of conduct that has already been challenged in a derivative suit in the Court of Chancery; (2) the company’s interest in having consistent rulings on related issues of Delaware law; (3) the fact that the company had–during the course of the litigation–adopted a forum selection bylaw specifying Delaware as the forum for any litigation related to the company’s internal affairs; and (4) the investment the company had already made in Delaware in addressing not only this matter, but also a previous derivative suit challenging related conduct.
Advisors of Delaware corporations should keep an eye on the remanded proceedings in the Court of Chancery, as this may become yet another tool in the corporate tool kit to combat multi-jurisdictional litigation and drive all litigation involving the internal affairs of a Delaware corporation to one specific jurisdiction.
