Two US judges gave final approval to a roughly $2.25 billion global settlement reached between Nortel Networks and its shareholders after the Canadian company revised its financial results between 2001 and 2005, an Associated Press report said.
The Associated Press report said District Judge Loretta Preska said the settlement reached earlier this year was 'fair, reasonable and adequate' to compensate people or entities who purchased common stock or sold options on Nortel stock between April 24, 2003 and April 27, 2004.
US District Judge Richard M. Berman said a similar deal reached on behalf of as many as 1.4 million investors in the company between October 24, 2000 and February 15, 2001 was fair and adequate.
Courts in Canada have yet to rule.
Berman wrote that the $1.14 billion represented by his half of the litigation in Manhattan was about 10% of the lead plaintiff's original $10 billion estimate of maximum possible damages facing the Canadian telecommunications company.
Preska said in a written opinion that the settlement benefits will come from a cash fund of $370 million that was earning interest and 314 million shares that will be issued to some of the more than one million investors eligible to make claims in the portion of the case she oversaw.
The money was part of a roughly $2.25 billion agreement announced earlier this year as Nortel reached tentative settlements in two Canadian lawsuits and US lawsuits, the report further said.