WisdomTree Poison Pill Draws Court Challenge From Investor (1)

An investor sued the board of WisdomTree Inc. in Delaware, claiming its anti-takeover poison pill reflects an overzealous and illegal effort to defuse legitimate shareholder activism.

The lawsuit accuses the nine-member board of adopting a “stockholder rights plan” with unlawful terms, particularly a provision that counts multiple investors acting in concert as a single bloc capable of triggering the poison pill if their collective holdings cross the 10% ownership threshold. That type of aggregation clause is commonly called a wolfpack provision.

Although the poison pill will expire if it’s not ratified by stockholders, the company has said it will apply ...