Dell Class V Settlement - stock in Vanguard Brokerage acct

[vanpt]

Was anyone issued Dell Class V shares as a result of their purchase of EMC/VMware Corp back in 2016 ? A class action suit was brought against Dell and they settled the lawsuit for $1 billion. Payout to the shareholders began recently but although I held a small amount of Dell shares in my Vanguard account, I did not receive any notification of the lawsuit or payout. I contacted the settlement administrator for the lawsuit and they said I was not in their register and to contact the brokerage service. I contacted Vanguard and they said they had no record of any correspondence with me with regard to this lawsuit. Anyone else in this situation ?

[vrr106]

You might want to ask on Reddit, although I am fairly certain the Class V stock was a tracking stock created for EMC/VMware shareholders. So unless you held one of those and it was converted to the tracking stock, it wouldn't apply to you. Holders of common Dell stock were probably in another class as far as I know.

[Rocinante Rider]

Not sure if it was from the same class action, but on 1/31/24 a payout for "Dell Technologies Corp Merger" suddenly appeared in my old Vanguard brokerage account (account was transferred into a new registration several years ago and had a $0 balance since then). My own on-line investigation and a call to a Vanguard rep confirmed that this payout was due to a class action settlement. I stopped buying individual stocks many years ago. I don't recall owning Dell, but I did at one time own EMC.

[vanpt]

Sounds like your payment was related to the Dell settlement. That's what I was expecting to hear when I contacted Vanguard. I'll look at my account just in case I missed it - didn't have a lot of shares. Thanks !

[vanpt]

Just checked my account and the settlement payout was there. I'm surprised the Vanguard folks didn't know about it after having their folks look into it. Saved me a lot of time researching what was happened. Thanks !

[TR-6060]

I had a payout from this settlement appear in my dormant Schwab account (converted from TD Ameritrade). Has anyone determined whether or not this distribution is taxable ?

I checked with Schwab yesterday, and no tax forms (e.g. 1099) have yet been generated in my account. Schwab's last 1099 release date is 2/28/2025 and I will call them again on 3/3/2025.

I emailed the Dell Class V Stockholder Litigation Settlement Administrator and their response was zero help.

[TR-6060]

I called Schwab again on 3/3/2025 and they confirmed that no 2024 tax forms had been generated for my dormant account which had received the Dell Class V Settlement deposit (the account had no taxable income in 2024).

Therefore, I will ignore the settlement proceeds when completing my 2024 taxes.