Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi L.L.P. is pleased to announce that The Goldman Sachs Group and Bain Capital Partners have agreed to pay a total $121 million in settlement of the firm’s class of plaintiffs clients in Dahl v. Bain Capital Partners. Bain has agreed to a settlement for $54 million, and Goldman Sachs agreed to a $67 million settlement, as two of seven defendants in that case. Plaintiffs are former shareholders of certain public companies who sold their shares to the Defendant private equity firms in large leveraged buyouts (“LBOs”) announced between 2003 and 2007.

In 2007, the defendants, all major U.S. private equity firms, were charged in the U.S. District Court, District of Massachusetts, with a market allocation and bid-rigging conspiracy that violates Section 1 of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1. The five other private equity firms include The Blackstone Group L.P., The Carlyle Group LLC, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., L.P., Silver Lake Technology Management L.L.C. and TPG Capital L.P. Plaintiffs sought damages as a result of the defendants’ alleged collusion to not bid against each other on deals to drive down the prices of many takeovers of publicly traded companies.