Commercial Division Rules Amended to Require Suits Seeking Equitable or Declaratory Relief to Meet Monetary Threshold

On January 28, 2025, the Chief Administrative Judge of the Courts signed an administrative order amending the criteria for Commercial Division cases and requiring cases seeking equitable or declaratory relief to also satisfy the monetary threshold (in Manhattan, $500,000) to be in the Commercial Division.

Under the prior version of this rule, the monetary threshold did not have to be met for cases seeking only equitable or declaratory relief, and so the only requirement for this type of case to qualify for the Commercial Division was that it was a commercial case (as described in the enumerated list of commercial cases in the Commercial Division Rules).

But under the amended rule, which becomes effective March 31, 2025, cases seeking equitable or declaratory relief are no longer exempted from the monetary threshold. And to determine whether this threshold is met, the court will look at the "value of the object of the action," which will be determined by the "value of the suit's intended benefit, the value of the right being protected, or the value of the injury being averted, whichever is greatest."

Contact the Commercial Division Blog Committee at commercialdivisionblog@schlamstone.com if you or a client have questions concerning this recent change to the Commercial Division Rules.