Leading Investor Rights Law Firm Grant & Eisenhofer Forms Exclusive Alliance with Kyros Law to Litigate Cases for Greek Investors

NEW YORK and ATHENS, Greece, Aug. 7, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Leading investor rights law firm Grant & Eisenhofer P.A. announced that it has formed a new alliance to help aggrieved investors in Greece bring actions in both Greece and in the United States.

G&E is teaming up with Boston-based Kyros Law, whose newly launched office in Athens is being headed by John Kyriakopoulos, former managing director of the Hellenic Pension Mutual Fund Management Company, Greece's largest pension institution with over $650 million in assets under management. Under Mr. Kyriakopoulos' leadership, HPMF doubled its assets over the second half of 2012, following what news reports described as HPMF's "daring" investment of more than 40% of the its holdings in Greek government bonds. 

This past May, Mr. Kyriakopoulos was appointed to lead a class action against the National Bank of Greece by OSPA, the union representing nearly 3,000 workers of Olympic Airlines.  OSPA has brought suit against the bank for structuring severance packages comprised of 70% in Greek government bonds, which lost more than half of their value following the 2012 restructuring of Greek's sovereign debt.  Mr. Kyriakopoulos has stated he can prove negligence in selling the bonds to public investors.

Under a joint agreement, G&E and Kyros Law will team up to work on investor-driven litigation coming in and out of Greece, including matters stemming from the country's recent economic meltdown.  The collaboration will benefit clients litigating in Greece through Kyros' new Athens office, as well as Greek investors litigating in the U.S. via Grant & Eisenhofer, which has offices in New York, Wilmington, DE, Washington, DC and Chicago.

Mr. Kyriakopoulos said: "We're thrilled to form an alliance with Grant & Eisenhofer, one of the world's preeminent litigation firms on behalf of investors and shareholders.  The firm's founders Stuart Grant and Jay Eisenhofer have secured numerous record-setting financial recoveries for clients and have won precedent-setting decisions upholding shareholder rights in the U.S. and in Europe.  G&E has been at the forefront of international investor advocacy, including creating new forums in Europe for resolving shareholder class actions.  Our new collaboration is an historic step for advancing the rights of investors in Greece, who have been battered in recent years and have had scant remedies or even avenues through which to pursue recovery."

Grant & Eisenhofer regularly represents European and international institutional investors. The firm led a coalition of global investors – more than 50 institutions in Europe, Australia and elsewhere – in successfully bringing a securities class action in the Netherlands against Royal Dutch Shell, which was accused of vastly overstating its oil reserves in financial disclosures.  The unprecedented action led to a payment of more than $500 million from the oil giant– the largest securities fraud settlement ever in Europe. G&E has litigated major shareholder cases in Germany, France and the UK.  In another noteworthy cross-border case, the firm represented Hermes Focus Asset Management Europe, Ltd. as lead plaintiff in a class action arising out of a multi-billion dollar fraud at Italian dairy Parmalat, which the SEC described as "one of the largest and most brazen corporate financial frauds in history." Settlements were reached with Parmalat, two investment banks, auditors and other defendants totaling over $110 million.

Grant & Eisenhofer has led some of the largest investor recoveries on record in U.S. securities cases, including the single biggest payment ever from a corporate defendant in a securities action ($2.975 billion, In re Tyco International, Ltd., Securities Litigation), as well as the largest-ever derivative settlement ($922 million, In re UnitedHealth Group Incorporated Shareholder Derivative Litigation).

"We look forward to partnering with Kyros Law on cases in Greece, where there is a growing tide of investor disputes stemming from the country's recent financial crisis," said G&E co-managing directors Mr. Grant and Mr. Eisenhofer.  "John Kyriakopoulos is known in Greece and throughout Europe as a pioneering  advocate for institutional investors and his experience as managing director of HPMF will be a major advantage in representing client matters originating in Greece."

Mr. Grant and Mr. Eisenhofer added: "Having worked with leading institutional investors throughout Europe in U.S. matters, we will now effectively be able to represent the interests of Greek investors bringing cases.  We especially hope to collaborate on behalf of Greek investors who have been shut out of recoveries in U.S. courts following the 2010 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Morrison v. NAB."

Konstantine Kyros, who manages Kyros Law in the U.S., said: "This promises to be a powerful partnership for both of our firms and for clients in need of top-flight litigation counsel in the U.S. and in Greece.  We believe that aligning with Grant & Eisenhofer will create a major new pathway for advancing recoveries for Greek investors."

About Grant & Eisenhofer

Grant & Eisenhofer P.A. represents plaintiffs in a wide range of complex financial litigation.  G&E's clients include institutional investors, whistleblowers and other stakeholders in bankruptcy litigation, securities class actions, derivative lawsuits, consumer class actions, antitrust suits, and cases involving the False Claims Act. G&E has recovered more than $13 billion for investors in the last five years and has consistently been cited by RiskMetrics for securing the highest average investor recovery in securities class actions. Grant & Eisenhofer has been named one of the country's top plaintiffs' law firms by The National Law Journal for the past eight years. For more information, visit www.gelaw.com.

About Kyros Law

Kyros Law specializes in a wide range of complex litigation, corporate governance matters, and mass torts, including the representation of whistleblowers, shareholders and consumers in securities fraud, false claims act and class actions. For more information, visit Kyros Law's U.S. website at www.kyroslawoffices.com or its Greece website at www.kyroslawoffices.gr 

Contact:
Allan Ripp 212-262-7477 [email protected]
Elise Martin 302-622-7004 [email protected]

SOURCE Grant & Eisenhofer, P.A.; Kyros Law