Twice, in 2017, the Delaware Supreme Court struck down statutory appraisal rulings by the Delaware Court of Chancery that dismissed the importance of the market price. Read more >>

The Delaware Supreme Court recently overturned a 2016 ruling by the Delaware Court of Chancery that arrived at fair value by weighting the results of three valuation techniques equally. The high court's Chief Justice Strine, who once headed the Chancery, found this approach was problematic and used the decision to provide valuation advice to his successor, Chancellor Bouchard, who had overseen the appraisal proceeding. Read more >>

Management projections are the sine qua non of a discounted cash flow analysis, and, in a recent statutory appraisal action involving the pet product giant PetSmart, the Delaware Court of Chancery found they did not cut the mustard. The court called the projections, “at best, fanciful,” and concluded the most accurate measure of fair value was the merger consideration. Read more >>

The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Perhaps Chancellor Bouchard thought of Aristotle when he recently ruled in a statutory appraisal action that, even though the results of three common valuation techniques were unreliable indicators of value, in combination they established fair value. Read more >>