You will hear argument this morning in case 23970 and Vita v. Iomen J. Orr funder A.B. Mr.

Katio.

Thank you, Mr. Chief Justice, and may it please the Court. The Reform Act's pleading standards are unique.

Congress looked at private securities litigation and saw big fishing expeditions in discovery and extortionate settlements.

They knew that for centuries heightened pleading had been required, but they supercharged it.

First, they required plaintiffs to, quote, state with particularity, facts giving rise to a strong

inference the defendant acted with the enter, a dramatic break with common law, and second,

they required for allegations outside of a plaintiff's personal knowledge, plaintiffs to, quote,

state with particularity all the facts on which their belief is formed. This double-heightened

pleading requirement exists in virtually no other context. Y2K is the lone example, and that is what resolves this case.

As our cert petition and the amici explain, the Ninth Circuit's decision creates an easy

roadmap for plaintiffs to evade the Reform Act.

When a stock drops, all they have to do is find an expert with numbers that contradict

a company's public statements,

then allege the company keeps records that executives look at,

and then argue those records would have matched the hired expert's numbers.

That's a recipe for Judge Friendly's warning of fraud by hindsight.

This complaint, which alleges that Jensen Long made false statements is a good example.

It's a grave accusation against a respected CEO, yet the complaint never shows the center to be as cogent and compelling as not.

It merely surmises that Wong reviewed internal reports showing a higher quantum of crypto purchases than what he disclosed, yet it never alleges the contents of those reports.

And to meet falsity, the complaint relies on an expert opinion with a series of implausible assumptions and inferences,

not particularized allegations of fact. Nothing dispels the more compelling explanation that Wong offered at the time.

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