In Re HPL Technologies, Inc. Securities Litigation

ORDER

By an order and judgments filed March 11, 2005 (Doc. ## 164-166), the court granted final approval to two settlements and a plan of allocation in this securities fraud class action. In the same order, the court reserved decision on lead plaintiffs motion for an award of attorneys’ fees and expenses to lead counsel. Doc. # 164 at 9-12. The award of fees and expenses is to be paid out of a common fund of $17 million and 7 million shares of HPL Technologies common stock (“HPL stock”)— the combined settlement consideration from all defendants. Under the proposed fee award, lead counsel would receive an award of 15% of the common fund (taken in both cash and stock), plus lead counsel’s reasonable expenses. The requested 15% award translates to $2.55 million and 1.05 million shares of HPL stock.

At first glance, such a percentage seems reasonable because fee awards in other cases have captured a larger portion of common fund recoveries (although in still other cases, lower percentage fee awards have been made). Furthermore, the fee here is below what has, in some decisions, been characterized as the 25% “benchmark” for common fund fee awards. See Paul, Johnson, Alston & Hunt v.…