Treasury Wine Estates has been served with a shareholder class action filed in the Federal Court of Australia by Maurice Blackburn Lawyers.
According to a statement released to the ASX by TWE, shareholder Brian Jones wishes to bring a claim on his own behalf and on behalf of persons who:
- Purchased shares in TWE on the ASX between 17 August 2012 and 9.30am on 15 July 2013
- Have entered into a litigation funding agreement with Bentham IMF Limited (the former name of IMF (Australia) Ltd
- Have suffered loss or damage by reason of the contraventions alleged by Mr Jones
Jones says that he purchased 1,000 shares in TWE on 21 September 2012 at an average price of $4.76 per share.
Jones alleges the TWE contravened its continuous disclosure obligations and also alleges misleading and deceptive conduct, relating to the performance of TWE’s US operations.
TWE has strongly denied the allegations and says that it will 'vigorously defend' the legal proceeding.
Litigation funder, IMF (Australia) claimed in October last year that TWE had engaged in ‘deceptive and misleading conduct’ in regards to disclosures to businesses' US operations and called upon shareholders to sign up for a court action.
In response to TWE’s announcement in January that the company expected earnings for the first half of 2014 to be substantially less than last year, Ben Slade, managing principle at Maurice Blackburn Lawyers said that the announced suggested that continuous disclosure requirements may not have been complied with.
"We are confident that the company's shock $190 million downgrade announcement in July last year was indicative of such a breach,” Slade said at the time.