IN RE MEXICAN GOVERNMENT BONDS ANTITRUST LITIGATION

Background

On March 30, 2018, Oklahoma Firefighters Pension & Retirement System and Electrical Workers Pension Fund Local 103, I.B.E.W. filed a class action complaint against numerous financial institutions and John Does 1-10. The complaint alleged that the defendants were the “exclusive Mexican government-approved market makers” for Mexican government bonds and asserted a claim under Section 1 of the Sherman Act, which prohibits certain agreements restraining trade.

Other plaintiffs later filed similar actions in the Southern District of New York. Five of those actions were assigned or reassigned to Judge J. Paul Oetken.

Court’s Action

The court ordered the five related actions consolidated under lead case number 18-CV-2830. It directed that all filings in the member cases be made in the lead case. The court emphasized that, despite consolidation, the cases retain their separate identities.

For administrative purposes, the Clerk of Court was directed to close the other five actions. The court stated that this order does not affect the rights of the parties in any of the consolidated cases.

Disposition and Classification

The court entered an administrative consolidation order. It did not rule on the merits of the antitrust claims. This is a procedural order because it addressed case management rather than deciding whether the alleged conduct violated antitrust law.