Glenmede Trust Co., N.A. v. Infinity Q Capital Mgt. LLC

2024 NY Slip Op 30373(U)
New York Supreme Court, New York County·Decided January 31, 2024·Unpublished

Opinion

Glenmede Trust Co., N.A. v Infinity Q Capital Mgt.

LLC

2024 NY Slip Op 30373(U)

January 31, 2024

Supreme Court, New York County Docket Number: Index No. 160830/2022 Judge: Melissa A. Crane

Cases posted with a "30000" identifier, i.e., 2013 NY Slip Op 30001(U), are republished from various New York State and local government sources, including the New York State Unified Court System's eCourts Service. This opinion is uncorrected and not selected for official publication.

NYSCEF DOC. NO. 203 RECEIVED NYSCEF: 01/31/2024

SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK NEW YORK COUNTY

PRESENT: HON. MELISSA A. CRANE PART 60M Justice

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------X INDEX NO. 160830/2022 THE GLENMEDE TRUST COMPANY, N.A., MOTION DATE 11/15/2023 Plaintiff,

MOTION SEQ. NO. 010 -v-

INFINITY Q CAPITAL MANAGEMENT LLC,JAMES VELISSARIS, LEONARD POTTER, SCOTT LINDELL, BONDERMAN FAMILY LIMITED PARTNERSHIP, LP, INFINITY Q MANAGEMENT EQUITY LLC,TRUST FOR ADVISED PORTFOLIOS, U.S. BANCORP FUND DECISION + ORDER ON SERVICES, LLC,EISNERAMPER LLP, QUASAR MOTION DISTRIBUTORS, LLC,JOHN C. CHRYSTAL, ALBERT J. DIULIO, CHRISTOPHER E. KASHMERICK, HARRY E. RESIS, RUSSELL B. SIMON, STEVEN J. JENSEN,

Defendant.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------X

The following e-filed documents, listed by NYSCEF document number (Motion 010) 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 149, 154, 159 were read on this motion to/for DISMISS .

Defendant EisnerAmper LLP (“EisnerAmper” or “Defendant”) has moved to dismiss Plaintiff The Glenmede Trust Company, N.A.’s (“Glenmede” or “Plaintiff”) amended complaint pursuant to CPLR 3211(a)(7). The amended complaint alleges one cause of action against EisnerAmper, for violation of section 11 of the Securities Act of 1933 (15 USC § 77k). For the following reasons, the court denies EisnerAmper’s motion to dismiss.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND The court refers to its December 21, 2023 decision and order on Defendant US Bancorp Fund Services, LLC’s (“US Bancorp”) motion to dismiss (NYSCEF Doc. No. 199) for a more complete recitation of the facts related to this matter. However, the court provides factual background specific to EisnerAmper.

160830/2022 THE GLENMEDE TRUST COMPANY, N.A. vs. INFINITY Q CAPITAL MANAGEMENT Page 1 of 12 LLC ET AL Motion No. 010

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[* 1]

NYSCEF DOC. NO. 203 RECEIVED NYSCEF: 01/31/2024

This matter arises in connection to the collapse of a mutual fund called Infinity Q Diversified Alpha Fund (“Mutual Fund”). Defendant Infinity Q Capital Management LLC (“Infinity Q”) managed the Mutual Fund, selecting the Mutual Fund’s portfolio of investments (Amended Complaint, NYSCEF Doc. No. 101, ¶¶ 28, 54). Individual defendants James Velissaris (“Velissaris”), David Bonderman (“Bonderman”), Leonard Potter (“Potter”), and Scott Lindell (“Lindell”) launched Infinity Q in 2014, allegedly to act as investment advisor for both the Mutual Fund and a separate private hedge fund (“Hedge Fund”) (id., ¶ 4). Rather than stock the Mutual Fund with traditional stocks and bonds, Infinity Q selected variance swaps as part of its strategy to “generate absolute returns that did not depend on what direction the market moved, but rather on how much the market moved (i.e., how volatile the market was)” (id., ¶ 5).1 However, because these types of securities had no readily available market prices, Infinity Q had to generate its own net asset value (“NAV”) of the assets in the Mutual Fund on a daily basis (id., ¶¶ 6-7). Infinity Q generated this NAV using the third-party valuation service that it purchased from Bloomberg, called BVAL (id., ¶ 131). The root of both this action and the criminal action in which Velissaris pled guilty is that, rather than report the NAV accurately, Velissaris artificially inflated the NAV by hundreds of millions of dollars through manipulating BVAL (id., ¶¶ 9-10, 167). In particular, the amended complaint alleges that Velissaris, among other things, entered incorrect inputs into BVAL and altered BVAL’s underlying code, resulting in the swaps being “massively overvalued” for several years (id., ¶¶ 169-78). This resulted in an SEC investigation beginning in 2020 and the subsequent collapse of the Mutual Fund (id., ¶¶ 11-13).

1

According to the amended complaint, variance swaps allow buyers to “bet on the volatility of an underlying asset, security, index, or currency exchange” (Amended Complaint, ¶ 116). For each variance swap, the parties determine a “strike price” (id., ¶ 118). If volatility “exceeds the strike price, the buyer of the swap . . . receives the payment,” but if volatility “is below the strike price, the seller of the swap . . . receives the payment” (id.).

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Motion No. 010

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NYSCEF DOC. NO. 203 RECEIVED NYSCEF: 01/31/2024

Plaintiff alleges causes of action under sections 11, 12(a)(2), and 15 of the Securities Act of 1933 against a number of “gatekeeper” defendants, who allegedly abdicated their duties and allowed the conduct that led to the collapse of the Mutual Fund to occur. One of those alleged gatekeepers is EisnerAmper. EisnerAmper is a public accounting firm which acted as the Mutual Fund’s auditor since 2018 (id., ¶ 34). In this role, EisnerAmper allegedly “conducted tasks to validate Infinity Q’s valuation of the Mutual Fund’s holdings, including attempting to independently verify those valuations,” and also “agreed to review the Mutual Fund’s portfolio on a quarterly basis to ensure that it was promptly made aware of any new derivative positions held by the Mutual Fund” (id.).

In particular, EisnerAmper allegedly issued audit reports in which EisnerAmper “stated that the Mutual Fund’s financial statements conformed with United States generally accepted accounting principles (‘U.S. GAAP’) and presented fairly, in all material respects: (a) the consolidated financial position of the Mutual Fund as of the audit date; (b) the consolidated results of the Mutual Fund’s operations as of the audit date; and (c) the changes in net assets and financial highlights for each of the years in the two-year period then ended” (id., ¶ 104). The amended complaint also alleges, in connection with its validation of Infinity Q’s valuation of the Mutual Fund’s holdings, EisnerAmper “communicated with the custodian, prime broker, and third-party counterparties of the Mutual Fund about those holdings” and “evaluated significant estimates made by Infinity Q by conducting a ‘re-performance’ test that attempted to replicate Infinity Q’s valuation of the Mutual Fund’s assets” (id., ¶ 106).

The Mutual Fund is a “series” of Defendant Trust for Advised Portfolios (“Trust”) (id., ¶ 32). On December 20, 2019, the Trust issued shares in the Mutual Fund pursuant to a registration statement (“December 2019 Registration Statement”) (id., ¶¶ 32, 142). The December 2019

160830/2022 THE GLENMEDE TRUST COMPANY, N.A. vs. INFINITY Q CAPITAL MANAGEMENT Page 3 of 12 LLC ET AL Motion No. 010

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NYSCEF DOC. NO. 203 RECEIVED NYSCEF: 01/31/2024

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Glenmede Trust Co., N.A. v. Infinity Q Capital Mgt. LLC, 2024 NY Slip Op 30373(U) (N.Y. Super. Ct. 2024).

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