Stockbroker Overtime Suits In Overdrive

As stockbrokers are piling up victories in lawsuits against their companies for overtime pay, industry observers expect a flood of new actions, Registered Rep reports. Two recent high-profile settlements resulted in Merrill Lynch paying out $37 million last August and UBS just two weeks ago agreeing to shell out around $89 million -- all that boding well for plaintiffs in other pending suits against Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and A.G. Edwards. 

Jacob Zamansky of Zamansky and Associates told Registered Rep that he expects to a see "a spike in class actions for broker wage and hour suits," especially in New Jersey New York. But the hot spot for such actions appears to be California, the site of the Merrill Lynch suit, where changes in the state's labor code no longer exempt brokers from overtime pay. The end result of the growing number of such class actions, plaintiffs' attorney Mark Theirman said in a Registered Rep interview, is that "these firms will modify their pay structures."