Breach of Fiduciary Duty: A fiduciary is an individual or corporation to whom property or power is entrusted for the benefit of another. Fiduciaries must prudently care for any such assets, and may also have a number of additional duties, depending on the nature of their fiduciary relationship. These duties include, without limitation: a duty of good faith and fair dealing, a duty of loyalty, a duty of impartiality, a duty to delegate, a duty to inform, and a duty to maintain adequate records. To succeed on a breach of fiduciary duty claim, the plaintiff must prove…
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Breach of Trustees’ Fiduciary Duty – Part 3: Duty to Administer Trusts Prudently and Duty to Inform, Report, and Maintain Adequate Records
In Part 2 of this series, we examined trustees’ duties of loyalty and impartiality. This post will examine the duty to administer trusts prudently and Part 4 will discuss the duty to delegate – or not delegate – in more depth. The duty to administer trusts involves the basic values of good faith, while the duty to inform, report, and maintain adequate records involves the reasonableness of a trustee’s actions. While these principals seem straight forward, they are a bit nuanced in practice. Duty to Administer Trusts Prudently The duty to administer trusts prudently mandates trustees carry…