De Atucha v. Commodity Exchange, Inc.

608 F. Supp. 510, 1985 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 19965
CourtDistrict Court, S.D. New York
DecidedMay 9, 1985
Docket82 Civ. 6546 (MEL)
StatusPublished
Cited by26 cases

This text of 608 F. Supp. 510 (De Atucha v. Commodity Exchange, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, S.D. New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
De Atucha v. Commodity Exchange, Inc., 608 F. Supp. 510, 1985 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 19965 (S.D.N.Y. 1985).

Opinion

LASKER, District Judge.

Jorge M.C.C. de Atucha (“de Atucha”) brings this suit, yet another case concerning the much publicized events in the silver market in 1979 and 1980, against The Commodity Exchange, Inc. (“Comex”), Comex Clearing Association, Inc., the Board of Trade of the City of Chicago (“CBOT”), the Board of Trade of the City of Chicago Clearing Corporation (the “exchange defendants”), as well as numerous other individuals and companies 1 (the “non-exchange defendants”). The motions are granted for lack of standing and the complaint is dismissed.

I.

On January 18, 1980, at a time when the price of silver was approximately fifty dollars per ounce, de Atucha, “a citizen and resident of Argentina”, Complaint II 5 (filed Oct. 1, 1982), purchased three silver contracts on the London Metals Exchange (“LME”) 2 at a total cost of approximately *512 $1,500,000. Id. at ¶ 29. On April 16, 1980 de Atucha liquidated 3 his “long” position 4 at a loss in excess of $1,000,000. Id. at ¶ 40. De Atucha alleges that the price at which he purchased the silver contracts was artificially high because of an alleged conspiracy among the non-exchange defendants. Id. at ¶ 30. As for the exchange defendants, de Atucha alleges that although they took action in January 1980 to counteract the purported conspiracy and to stabilize the then volatile silver market, the corrective measures were taken too late. Id. at ¶ 38. 5

The complaint presents five claims. Against the non-exchange defendants de Atucha asserts that the defendants (1) conspired to and manipulated silver and silver futures 6 contract prices in violation of the Commodities Exchange Act (“CEA”) § 9(b); 7 (2) cheated and defrauded de Atucha and the silver markets and wilfully made false reports and statements to de Atucha in violation of CEA §§ 4b 8 and 4c; 9 (3) conspired to “unreasonably restrain interstate trade and commerce in silver and silver futures contracts in the United States and between the United States and ... England, with the intent and effect of raising and fixing the prices or [sic] silver and silver futures contracts,” Complaint ¶ 47, in violation of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, § 1, 15 U.S.C. § 1 (1982); and (4) monopolized the silver and silver futures contracts trade and commerce in the United States and England in violation of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, § 2, 15 U.S.C. § 2 (1982). Id. at ¶ 51. Finally, de Atucha alleges that the “acts, practices and omissions” of the exchange defendants were wilfully in bad faith or negligent, and in either case, violated CEA §§ 5a(8) 10 and 5(d). 11 Id. at ¶ 55.

In support of de Atucha’s claims the complaint also states, among other things:

The London Exchange, located in London, England, is also a market for silver futures contract trading. Because of the fungibility of silver and silver futures, the United States market represented by the Comex and CBOT and the London Exchange function from an economic standpoint as a single market____

Id. at ¶ 28.

Two motions are pending. The non-exchange defendants move pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) to dis *513 miss (1) the antitrust claims against them on the ground that plaintiff lacks “antitrust standing” and (2) the claims against them arising under the CEA on the ground that de Atucha has not established standing under that Act. The exchange defendants also move to dismiss the complaint against them pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6), Fed.R.Civ.P., on the ground that plaintiff lacks standing to sue. For the reasons set forth below the complaint is dismissed.

II.

Antitrust Claims

De Atucha seeks treble damages pursuant to the Clayton Act, § 4, 15 U.S.C. § 15 (1982), based upon the non-exchange defendants’ alleged attempt to monopolize and restrain the silver and silver futures trade and commerce. The non-exchange defendants argue that de Atucha lacks standing to sue under Section 4 because de Atucha’s injury occurred outside of United States commerce and his injury, if any, was too remote from the alleged violation to sustain a claim under United States antitrust law. The defendants 12 further argue that de Atucha cannot sue under Section 4 because plaintiffs alleged injury resulted from a restraint on foreign, rather than American commerce. Although the complaint alleges that the defendants attempted to monopolize (and restrain the trade of) the world silver market, see, e.g., Complaint ¶ 30(b), de Atucha’s theory of standing, as we understand it, is that he may sue under American antitrust laws because the defendants’ manipulation of the American silver markets produced his injury on the LME. See Transcript (Jun. 3, 1983) (oral argument) at p. 15. De Atucha further argues that as a trader in silver commodities he has standing to maintain an action under the antitrust laws against those who attempted to monopolize the world silver market since, he asserts, he is “clearly in the target area” of the antitrust violation and because he sustained direct injury.

De Atucha’s reliance on the target area test, the approach to Section 4 standing previously followed in this Circuit, is misplaced. As the Court of Appeals recently explained:

This is not the proper method of analysis. With two recent elaborate Supreme Court opinions with respect to the scope of § 4 of the Clayton Act on the books, courts in this circuit should start their analysis of standing under § 4 with the Supreme Court opinions [in Associated General Contractors of California, Inc. v. California State Council, 459 U.S. 519, 103 S.Ct. 897, 74 L.Ed.2d 723 (1983) and Blue Shield of Virginia v. McCready, 457 U.S. 465, 102 S.Ct. 2540, 73 L.Ed.2d 149 (1982)] rather than engage in extensive parsing of Billy Baxter, [Inc. v. Coca-Cola Co., 431 F.2d 183

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Bluebook (online)
608 F. Supp. 510, 1985 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 19965, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/de-atucha-v-commodity-exchange-inc-nysd-1985.