Commercial Division Blog: Current Developments in the Commercial Divisions of the New York State Courts

On December 12, 2023, the Appellate Division, First Department issued a decision in IKB International, S.A. in Liquidation v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. and several other consolidated actions, Case Nos. 2022-04133, 2022-04134, 2022-04178, and 2022-04194. Schlam Stone & Dolan serves as co-counsel for Plaintiffs-Respondents in these actions. The First Department affirmed the trial court’s rejection of the argument by Defendants-Appellants on summary judgment that the German statute of limitations governed the timeliness of Plaintiffs’ breach of contract claims, holding that the law of the place of the party that assigned the claims to Plaintiffs, in this case Ireland, was the proper foreign law to consider pursuant to New York’s borrowing statute, CPLR 202. The First Department explained: Read More

On March 28, 2023, Justice Joel. M. Cohen of the New York County Commercial Division issued a decision in Andes Petroleum Ecuador Ltd. v. Occidential Petroleum Corp, 2023 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1385. In this action, where the claims accrued in Ecuador and thus the Ecuador statute of limitations applied, the Court had previously denied defendant’s motion to dismiss, “finding that [defendant] failed to meet its burden of showing that [plaintiff’s] claims were time-barred under Ecuadorian law.” The First Department reversed and remanded with the instruction that “the Court consider ‘the expert evidence provided by each side concerning what Ecuadorian causes of action are most closely analogous to the New York causes of action’ for fraudulent conveyance.” On remand, the Court held that the most closely analogous Ecuadorian cause of action had a four-year statute of limitations, and that because the claims had been filed more than four years after they accrued, the Court granted the motion to dismiss. The Court explained: Read More