partnership

December 14, 2016

Texas Appeals Court Affirms Partnership Dissolution Verdict

A partnership has no obligation to complete performance of its executory contracts, the Texas Court of appeals held in affirming a multi-million dollar trial court verdict involving a chain of TGI Fridays in Dallas.

The case involved a joint venture formed with TGI Fridays and several entites that qualified as “disadvantaged.” The joint venture operated restaurants in four Dallas International Airport terminals from 1995, but as a result of changes in FAA regulations and disputes among the joint venture participants, the enterpise began to unravel in 2004.

The case was tried to a jury, which apportioned substantial awards of damages and attorneys fees and found that good cause existed for the dissolution of the business in that it was no longer reasonably practicable to carry on the business in conformity with its governing documents.

October 25, 2016

Who’s the Agent Here? Partners’ Ability to Act for the Partnership

by Jay R. McDaniel, Esq.

It is not unusual that a dispute between the owners of a closely held business also involves a dispute about the authority of one of the owners to act as agent for the entity. We had a recent case, for example, in which a central issue was whether the manager of a limited liability company exercised his business discretion in a way that was in the best interests of the business.

Once that dispute was on the table, we had to look at whether the manager had express or implied authority to act — in this case to hire a third party — and whether that exercise of authority was within the scope of the generally delegated authority provided to the manager by the operating agreement, or required an affirmative vote of the owners.

Professor Douglas Moll, writing on the law professors blog, parses the issues nicely under the most recent iteration of the Uniform Partnership Act, which has been widely adopted by state legislatures. For Professor Moll, the question of authority turns on the extent to which an ordinary business transaction is involved.

June 27, 2016

Partner Who Wrongfully Dissolved Partnership Hit With Whopping 66% Minority Discount

by Jay R. McDaniel, Esq.

Talk about playing your cards wrong.

A partner with a 3.08% interest worth $4.85 million in a partnership that owns a major shopping mall likely will walk away with only a few hundred thousand dollars after a court decision finding that he wrongfully dissolved the partnership and deducting from the value of his interest the other partners’ damages including legal fees, a 15% discount for goodwill, a 35% marketability discount, and a whopping 66% minority discount.

Last week’s decision by the Brooklyn-based Appellate Division, Second Department, in Congel v Malfitano, 2016 NY Slip Op 03845 [2d Dept May 18, 2016], rejected the partner’s appeal from the trial court’s determination of wrongful dissolution and also upheld its valuation determination with one major exception: the appellate court held that the trial court erred by failing to apply a minority discount and that it should have applied a 66% minority discount based on the “credible” expert testimony “supported by the record.”

February 11, 2016

Majority Rule Creates Fiduciary Duties

by Jay R. McDaniel, Esq.

The three majority members of a five-member limited liability company decide that they want to take a major action, such as selling the assets of the business or buying another business. They present the decision to the minority and proceed over their objections (We’ll assume for the moment that the action is permitted by the Operating Agreement.) The minority are bitterly opposed. Is this a problem? Often, it is.

Majority Rule and Minority Rights

The line between what is a right as an equity owner and what is a breach of fiduciary duty to the minority members is often blurry. We presume that as the owner of equity in a business, be it a limited liability, partnership, or a corporation, that we have the right to vote our economic self interest.

March 13, 2012

Lease Renewals Save Otherwise Time-Barred Breach of Fiduciary Duty Claims in a Partnership

by Jay R. McDaniel, Esq.

The New Jersey Appellate Division affirmed a trial court decision holding that lease renewals would revive stale claims in a partnership dispute. In Munoz v. Perla, et al., A-5922-08T3, the Munoz brought claims, among others, for breach of fiduciary duty for his partners’ failure to charge fair market rates in connection with the lease of the partnership’s property. Despite that the rents were calculated and leases drawn up in 1994, the partnerships acts of renewing the leases in 2003 were found to be separate acts that revived the otherwise time-barred claims.

Formation of the Partnership

Munoz was one of three partners in a real estate venture called The Heritage Partnership. The three partners for started their business relationship in 1983 as principals of a professional engineering firm. Munoz was an inactive partner of Heritage and was not involved in the partnership’s day-to-day operations. The purpose in forming Heritage was to “maintain, operate, manage, sell and/or lease” a commercial building. Each partner contributed capital to the venture and held a one-third ownership interest. The parties’ partnership agreement provided that their rights and obligations were governed by the Uniform Partnership Act, N.J.S.A. 42:1A-1 to -56.

January 3, 2012

Fiduciary Duties Change With Time

by Jay R. McDaniel, Esq.

Partnership Failed to Keep Inactive Partner Informed

The fiduciary duties owed among partners can change with time and circumstances, and the disclosures that were appropriate when all of the partners worked together in the business may become inadequate when one of the partners has ceased to take an active role.

This is the lesson of Munoz v. Perla, Docket No. A-5922-08T3 (App. Div. Dec. 20, 2011) in which the Appellate Division affirmed a trial court decision holding that the members of a partnership had failed to make adequate disclosure of the terms of the leases held by the engineering firm, of which the parties had all once been partners.

Although the case involved the now-repealed Uniform Partnership Act, and thus not all of the holdings may be applicable to partnerships formed under later law, the decision is instructive as to how the fiduciary relationships between partners my evolve as time passes and circumstances change. (For another reason decision involving fiduciary duties among partners, see our blog post here.)

August 19, 2011

Book Value is Not Fair Value in Partnership Buyout

by Jay R. McDaniel, Esq.

Socialite’s Family Partnership Interest

Book value can have a few different meanings. The best definition is simply the value of assets and liabilities that a company carries on its books. Is it different than the “fair value” standard applied in statutory buyouts? Yes– a lot different.

There are many partnership agreements and corporate buy-sell agreements still in effect with a book value buyout provision. They tend to be older entities, often involving family businesses, and I cringe whenever I look at the agreement and see the term applied to the company’s value.

Book Value Used to Buy Socialite’s Interest

A recent decision involving the estate of socialite Claudia Cohen demonstrates why. Estate of Claudia Cohen v. Booth Computers, et al., Docket No. A-0319-09T2. Estate of Cohen App Div.pdf. (Thanks also to Peter Mahler’s NY Business Divorce blog for finding the trial decision. Cohen Chancery Div.pdf.) In that decision, the Cohen’s estate argued that the book value of a successful business was just less than 2 percent of its fair value – $ 178,000 as opposed to $11.526 million – and sought to reform the partnership agreement. The effort failed and the Appellate Division affirmed the trial court’s enforcement of the agreement. The disparity between book value and fair value was not, in the court’s opinion, reason to alter an otherwise unambiguous document.

The result was a windfall for the last surviving partner, Claudia’s bother James, and the same result is likely to occur in most agreements that set the value of the business at book value rather than fair value.

The Cohen case involved a partnership formed by the late Robert Cohen, an entrepreneur who amassed a considerable fortune through various entities including the Hudson News Group. He had three children – Claudia, Michael and James. Claudia, well known in Manhattan and Hamptons social circles, was also an editor of Page 6 of the New York Post and the ex-wife of entrepreneur Ronald Perelman.

The estate, with Perelman as executor, brought suit against Booth Computers and Claudia’s brother, James, after Claudia’s interest in a family partnership was valued at a fraction of the fair value of the partnership’s holdings.