The impact on shareholder value of top defense counsel in mergers and acquisitions litigation

- Top defense litigation counsel are involved significantly more in cash deals, non-same-industry deals and friendlier deals.
- Top defense litigation counsel are involved more in proposals with smaller initial takeover premium.
- Top defense litigation counsel negotiate cheaper and faster settlements than other defense litigation counsels.
- Top defense litigation counsel are better able to handle the complexity that accompany multijurisdictional litigation cases.
- The interests of top defense litigation counsel seem aligned with that of their clients: the target firm management.

Defense litigation counsel are retained by target firm management to defend them in mergers and acquisition (M&A) litigation. We use hand collected data from a ten-year period (2003 − 2012) to examine whether the choice of defense litigation counsel affects the outcome of M&A litigation and shareholder value. We construct league tables for defense litigation firms and identify the top 10 defense litigation firms. Comparing these firms with all other defense litigation firms, we find that top defense litigation counsel are involved in a significantly higher proportion of cash deals, non-same-industry deals (implying a lower possibility of antitrust-related concerns), and friendlier deals, all of which are associated with smaller initial takeover premium proposals. We find evidence that, controlling for endogeneity, top defense litigation counsel negotiate cheaper and faster settlements than other defense litigation counsel thereby protecting low premium deals from more serious challenges. We also show that top defense litigation counsel are more effective in multijurisdictional litigation cases, again obtaining cheaper and faster settlements in low premium deals, which we theorize shows that they are better able to handle the complexity and strategy that accompany these lawsuits.