What Damages are Available for a Breach of Fiduciary Duty?
Under California law, victims of a fiduciary breach can pursue several types of legal and equitable remedies to recover their losses and hold the wrongdoer accountable. The primary damages and remedies include:
- Compensatory Damages: This is the most common form of monetary recovery. It is calculated by measuring the difference between the injured party’s actual position and the position they would have been in had the breach not occurred. This can include lost profits, diminished business value, and expenses caused by the misconduct.
- Consequential Damages: These cover secondary harms that were a reasonably foreseeable result of the breach, such as the cost of rebuilding client relationships or addressing regulatory penalties.
- Disgorgement of Profits: This equitable remedy requires the breaching fiduciary to surrender any financial gains they obtained through the breach, even if the injured party did not suffer a direct corresponding loss.
- Equitable Remedies: Courts may employ additional tools such as rescission (unwinding a contract to return parties to their original positions) or the imposition of a constructive trust (treating the breaching party as a trustee holding wrongfully acquired assets for the injured party).
- Attorney Fees: In certain cases, California law may allow for the recovery of attorney fees.
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