Securities Class Action Settlements

Featured Experts

Featured Experts

Ashley Langer

Associate Professor of Economics,
Eller College of Management,
University of Arizona

Ashley Langer is an econometrics, energy, and industrial organization expert. Professor Langer applies sophisticated empirical methods to study regulation, competition, and firm and consumer behavior. She analyzes a range of economic issues, including those involving energy markets, transportation, and the environment. Professor Langer has testified on issues related to class certification and economic damages, including in such high-profile class actions as Guzman et al. v. Polaris Inc. et al. and Garcia et al. v. Volkswagen Group of America Inc. et al.

Professor Langer has analyzed consumer decisions, including those related to the automotive and oil industries. She has evaluated decisions on which vehicles to drive, how preferences form, when and where to purchase fuel, and whether to adopt electric vehicles. She has also investigated the impact of consumer demographic group preferences on vehicle pricing.

In her recent research, Professor Langer has assessed energy and environmental policy design issues. For example, she has analyzed international oil markets and the factors that influence pricing, as well as how Clean Air Act regulatory enforcement affects pollution levels and firms’ investment decisions. Further, she has studied the impact of energy policy on durable goods such as automobiles and residential solar. In particular, Professor Langer has examined how households respond to solar subsidies that change over time, how uncertainty surrounding policy enforcement affects coal power plant retirement and upgrade decisions, and how taxing vehicle mileage (rather than fuel consumption) changes Highway Trust Fund revenues. Her earlier work includes assessing the effect of congestion tolling on urban land use.

Professor Langer’s research has been published in leading academic journals, including the American Economic Review, the Journal of Public Economics, and the Review of Economics and Statistics. She is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER).

At the University of Arizona, Professor Langer teaches courses in business strategy, empirical research methods, environmental economics, energy and environmental policy, and government regulation. She has been honored with several teaching and advising awards. In addition, Professor Langer presents on industrial organization and empirical research methods, as well as transportation, energy, and environmental topics, at professional conferences and universities in the United States and internationally.

Professor Langer previously taught at the Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. She was a visiting scholar at Columbia Business School and the Energy Policy Institute of Chicago, University of Chicago.

Featured Experts

Todd T. Milbourn

Vice Dean of Faculty and Research,
Hubert C. and Dorothy R. Moog Professor of Finance,
Olin Business School,
Washington University in St. Louis

Todd Milbourn is an expert on valuation, corporate finance, and corporate governance, notably executive compensation and its impact on company stock price, corporate risk-taking, and firm performance. Professor Milbourn has been retained as an expert by private firms, the U.S. Department of Justice, and by individuals in cases related to fair rates of return, breach of contract damages, lost earnings, investment programs, and managerial/executive compensation, including employee stock option programs.

Professor Milbourn has addressed issues related to credit ratings and bank megamergers. He is a coauthor of the executive-level book, The Value Sphere: Secrets of Creating and Retaining Shareholder Wealth, and has published articles in leading scholarly journals, including Journal of FinanceJournal of Financial EconomicsHarvard Business ReviewSloan Management ReviewManagement ScienceJournal of Accounting Research, and RAND Journal of Economics.

At Washington University in St. Louis, Professor Milbourn has taught finance-related courses for nearly two decades. An award-winning educator, he has been recognized numerous times for teaching excellence, and his faculty research has twice been honored with the Olin Award: Research That Transforms Business.

Professor Milbourn has experience as a board member of multiple hedge funds and is the current Audit Committee Chair of a hedge fund. He has experience as a board member on multiple special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs), including serving as chair of the Audit Committee. Professor Milbourn also speaks extensively at professional and scholarly conferences in Canada, Europe, the United Kingdom, and across the United States.

Before joining the faculty of Olin Business School, Professor Milbourn taught at the University of Chicago and London Business School.

Featured Experts

Laura E. Simmons

Senior Advisor

Laura Simmons has more than twenty-five years of experience in economic consulting across a variety of complex litigation matters. Dr. Simmons has focused on damages and liability issues in securities class actions, as well as litigation involving the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA). She has also managed cases involving financial accounting, valuation, and corporate governance issues.

Dr. Simmons assists clients with all phases of litigation and has experience across civil, criminal, and regulatory matters. She has served as a testifying expert in cases involving accounting analyses, securities case damages, ERISA issues, and research on securities lawsuits.

Dr. Simmons developed Cornerstone Research’s initiatives on securities case settlements and related settlements benchmarking models. Her research on pre– and post–Reform Act securities litigation settlements has been published in a number of reports and is frequently cited in the public press and legal journals. She has also published in academic journals, with recent research focusing on the intersection of accounting and litigation. Dr. Simmons speaks at professional and specialist conferences and has appeared on CNBC to discuss the topic of securities case settlements.

Dr. Simmons was an accounting faculty member at the Mason School of Business at the College of William & Mary from 2008 through 2011. A certified public accountant (CPA), she began her career at Price Waterhouse.

Featured Experts

Kathryn L. Shaw

Ernest C. Arbuckle Professor of Economics,
Stanford Graduate School of Business;
Senior Fellow, Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR),
Stanford University

Kathryn Shaw is a nationally recognized expert on labor economics who addresses human resource management, wages, and discrimination issues. She has been retained in high-profile labor matters and has expertise in class certification issues.

Professor Shaw is the incoming president of the Society of Labor Economists, to serve from 2022 through 2025 (first as the President-elect). She is known for having co-developed the research field of “insider econometrics,” which uses internal (or “inside”) company data to analyze how practices such as teamwork and incentive pay affect performance.

In her recent research, Professor Shaw has worked on artificial intelligence (AI) topics, including how the performance of firms improves with uses of AI. She has also analyzed talent management in the software and other knowledge-intensive industries. Her new research papers are focused on different aspects of successful entrepreneurship.

Professor Shaw’s research has been published in the American Economic Review, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the Journal of Labor Economics, and the Journal of Economics and Management Strategy. She was associate editor of the Journal of Labor Economics and the Review of Economics and Statistics, and editor of IZA World of Labor. Professor Shaw is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), where she coheads the Personnel Economics working group.

Professor Shaw has been honored with multiple awards for excellence in teaching. She teaches courses on personnel economics, people management and organizational strategy, and the impact of AI on productivity.

Before joining the faculty at Stanford, Professor Shaw was the Ford Distinguished Research Chair and Professor of Economics at Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper School of Business. She has also held visiting academic appointments at University College London, the MIT Sloan School of Management, and the University of Paris.

Earlier in her career, Professor Shaw served as a Senate-confirmed member of the U.S. President’s Council of Economic Advisers in the Clinton administration, and as visiting economist to the Board of Governors at the Federal Reserve.

 

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Insights

24 April 2024

2024 TEC Institute Summit Brussels

The summit features global industry, policy, and academic experts on the intersection of technology, economics, and competition (TEC).

28 March 2024

Changes in Classwide Conduct: Leveraging Machine Learning to Overcome Challenges with Sentiment Analysis

Mike DeCesaris and Ernest Kim Song of Cornerstone Research will discuss advances in machine learning and AI at this webinar hosted by Strafford.

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Vault Ranks Cornerstone Research among Top Five Best Economic Consulting Firms in 2024

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Forbes Magazine Names Cornerstone Research to 2024 List of America’s Best Management Consulting Firms

The firm is recognized for the seventh consecutive year, with new rankings in Health Care & Life Sciences and Mergers & Acquisitions.

8 March 2024

Mergers That Create a Better Workplace? Some Practical Considerations Raised by Guideline 10 of the 2023 Merger Guidelines

Craig Malam will moderate this webinar panel hosted by the American Bar Association Section of Antitrust Law.

7 March 2024

International Women’s Day 2024: Inspire Inclusion

March 8 is International Women’s Day, a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural, and political achievements of women.

6 March 2024

Number of Securities Class Action Settlements Falls as Median Settlement Amount Reaches Highest Level Since 2010

Total assets of issuer defendants are the highest among post–Reform Act settlements.

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In the Matter of Securus Technologies Inc. and Inmate Calling Solutions LLC

The parties abandoned their intent to merge after the DOJ opened its investigation into the acquisition.

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