Institutional Shareholder Services Ranks Top 50 Plaintiffs' Law Firms for 2006

ROCKVILLE, Md., March 6 /PRNewswire/ -- Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS), the world's leading provider of corporate governance and proxy voting services, today announced that its wholly-owned subsidiary, Securities Class Action Services (SCAS), has released its annual list of the top 50 plaintiffs law firms ranked by the total dollar amount of final securities class action settlements occurring in 2006 in which the law firms served as lead or co-lead counsel. This is the fourth year ISS has published its 'SCAS 50' list, which is intended to help institutional investors maximize shareholder value by highlighting those firms bringing in the most settlement dollars and playing the most active role in U.S. class action cases.

SCAS maintains the industry's most comprehensive database on securities class action litigation and provides professional monitoring and claims filing services to investment managers whose clients have a stake in class action suits.

The top five law firms on this year's "SCAS 50" list were Lerach Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins; Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossmann; Heins Mills & Olson; Milberg Weiss Bershad & Schulman; and Entwistle & Capucci.

  SCAS
   50                               Settlement       # of
  Rank        Law Firm                Total      Settlements   Average

  1    Lerach Coughlin Stoia
        Geller Rudman &
        Robbins LLP               $7,307,050,000      30     $243,568,333

  2    Bernstein Litowitz Berger
        & Grossmann               $2,634,765,298       9     $292,751,700

  3    Heins Mills & Olson PLC    $2,500,000,000       1   $2,500,000,000

  4    Milberg Weiss Bershad LLP  $1,604,608,808      22      $72,936,764

  5    Entwistle & Cappucci       $1,100,000,000       1   $1,100,000,000

"Securities class action settlements reached a record high of more than $18 billion in 2006," said Adam Savett, vice president of ISS' Securities Class Action Services. "The law firm of Lerach Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins moved up in the rankings this year on ISS' 'SCAS 50' list, due in no small measure to the $6.6 billion in Enron settlements that were finalized in 2006. Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossmann remained in the top two for the fourth consecutive year, with more than $2.4 billion in settlements in the McKesson HBOC, Nortel Networks, and Freddie Mac class actions alone."

"Six of the ten largest settlements of all time were finalized last year," added Savett. "This trend appears to be driven by more institutional investors participating in the securities litigation process, with institutional investors having served as lead plaintiffs in each of those six cases. Increasingly, international institutional investors are also expanding their roles and serving as lead plaintiffs in U.S. class action cases."

Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossmann also achieved the highest average settlement amount among law firms with at least three settlements, averaging $292 million in its nine settlements. The average settlement amount is an important indicator of which law firms are consistently bringing and settling high-impact cases. Also, for the second year in a row, Lerach Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins was the most active firm with 30 settlements, leading all firms with respect to the total number of final settlements.

      SCAS
       50                           Settlement       # of
 Rank Rank       Law Firm              Total      Settlements    Average

  1     2  Bernstein Litowitz
            Berger & Grossmann     $2,634,765,298      9      $292,751,700

  2     1  Lerach Coughlin Stoia
            Geller Rudman &
            Robbins LLP            $7,307,050,000     30      $243,568,333

  3     7  Kirby McInerney & Squire  $650,900,000      5      $130,180,000

  4     8  Abbey Spanier Rodd
            Abrams & Paradis         $590,925,000      8       $73,865,625

  5     4  Milberg Weiss Bershad
            LLP                    $1,604,608,808     22       $72,936,764

  *Firms had to have a minimum of 3 settlements.

"With the substantial growth in settlement dollars on the table, it is even more important now for institutional investors to file claim forms and obtain recoveries from these cases," noted Savett.

Nearly 500 financial institutions utilize ISS' database or complete claims filing solution to fulfill their fiduciary duty to file claims in class action settlements on behalf of their investment clients. With 15 years of history and more than 4,000 cases tracked, ISS' database also serves as an important compliance tool for asset managers to perform this critical fiduciary responsibility. Additionally, many of the law firms included in the SCAS 50 utilize ISS' database to monitor class action suits and gain access to important claims and settlement information.

For a copy of the full SCAS 50 report, including a description of the methodology used to prepare the report, please visit: http://www.issproxy.com/institutional/analytics/scas50full2006.jsp .

About Institutional Shareholder Services

ISS, the world's leading provider of corporate governance and proxy voting solutions, is a subsidiary of RiskMetrics Group. Founded in 1985, ISS provides proxy research, voting services and corporate governance advisory services to financial institutions and corporations worldwide. Together, ISS and RiskMetrics Group help investors manage across multiple classes of interrelated risk. ISS is headquartered in Rockville, Maryland with offices in Washington DC, Amsterdam, Brussels, Chicago, London, Manila, Melbourne, New York, Paris, Tokyo and Toronto. For more information on ISS, visit http://www.issproxy.com/.

  Contact:  Cheryl Gustitus             Tel: 301.556.0538
            Senior Vice President,      Email: cheryl.gustitus@issproxy.com
             Communications

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