Class Action Developments

摘要

Two recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions are likely to affect class action cases, including those involving consumer-finance related claims, by limiting the ability to file successive class claims after class certification is denied, and by restricting the ability to bring a nationwide class action outside of a defendant's home jurisdiction. During the October 2017 term, the Court held that the pendency of a motion for class certification only tolls the statute of limitations for the individual claims of putative class members and does not toll the statute for claims brought on a class-action basis. And following the previous term's decision in Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior Court of California,1 a split has arisen in the district courts as to whether courts may exercise jurisdiction over a nationwide class action asserting state-law claims against a nonresident defendant.