Gary I. Smith Jr.

Experience

Antitrust/Competition

• In re LIBOR-Based Financial Instruments Antitrust Litigation – In which a certified class of purchasers of over-the-counter (OTC) financial instruments with interest payments tied to the London Interbank Offering Rate (LIBOR) are challenging the collusive manipulation of U.S. Dollar LIBOR by the world’s largest financial institutions. The collusion is claimed to have suppressed the U.S. Dollar LIBOR rate, which allowed the defendant banks to benefit financially to the detriment of their counterparties in OTC financial instruments such as swaps and bonds. The case has resulted in $781 million in settlements with twelve banks, and continues against the remaining five defendant banks.
• In re Broiler Chicken Grower Antitrust Litigation – in which a certified class of broiler chicken farmers (referred to as “Growers”) claim that over twenty of the country’s largest poultry producers, including Tyson, Pilgrim’s, Perdue, Koch Foods, and Sanderson Farms colluded to suppress Grower pay through agreements not to recruit, solicit, or “poach” one another’s Growers and through comprehensive and systematic exchanges of Grower compensation information. Settlements have been reached with Tyson ($21 million), Perdue ($14.75 million), Koch Foods ($15.5 million), Sanderson Farms ($17.75 million), and Pilgrim’s Pride ($100 million) totaling $169 million.
• In re Dental Supplies Antitrust Litigation – In which a proposed class of private dental practices claimed that the four major distributors of dental products and equipment conspired to fix margins, divide markets and allocate customers, and orchestrate industry boycotts of lower-priced, innovative rivals. Gary beat the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) to the courthouse by almost two years, with the FTC filing a related lawsuit against the dental distributor companies well after the private plaintiffs first initiated their action, borrowing legal theories first investigated and advanced by the private plaintiffs. The private plaintiffs’ action was settled just minutes before a class certification Daubert hearing was set to commence for $80 million. 
• Adriana M. Castro, M.D., P.A. v. Sanofi Pasteur Inc. – In which a certified class of wholesalers, hospitals, and physicians that purchased Sanofi’s quadrivalent conjugate meningococcal vaccine (MCV4) Menactra (a vaccine for Meningitis) claimed that Sanofi monopolized the MCV4 market by threatening large price penalties across Sanofi’s broad line of pediatric vaccines if pediatricians purchased MCV4 vaccines from Sanofi’s only MCV4 rival, Novartis’s Menveo. The suit claimed that Sanofi’s conditional pricing practices had the purpose and effect of foreclosing Sanofi’s only MCV4 rival from the market, allowing Sanofi to continue to charge monopoly prices for Menactra. The case settled in December 2016 for $61.5 million.
• In re Transpacific Passenger Air Transportation Antitrust Litigation – In which a certified class of consumers of transpacific passenger air travel claimed that thirteen airlines conspired to fix the prices of certain air fares and fuel surcharges. The last of the thirteen defendants settled on the eve of trial for $58 million, bringing the total settlements in the case to over $147 million.
• In Re: RealPage, Inc., Rental Software Antitrust Litigation – Hausfeld serves as co-lead counsel in the federal antitrust class action against RealPage, Inc. and several of their property management clients, alleging that the Defendants, some of the largest owners and managers of rental real estate in the United States, conspired to use RealPage’s so-called “revenue management” service to set rental prices and restrict the supply of available rental units in major metropolitan areas across the United States.