Court Opinion

ID: 9407945
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-07-10 21:01:03.567789+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:20:40.914663
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 22-10633     Document: 58-1       Date Filed: 07/10/2023   Page: 1 of 55

                                                                [PUBLISH]
                                      In the
                 United States Court of Appeals
                          For the Eleventh Circuit

                            ____________________

                                   No. 22-10633
                            ____________________

        NORMAN MACPHEE,
        Individually and on Behalf of all others
        similarly situated.
        et al.,
                                                                   Plaintiﬀ,
        CARPENTERS PENSION FUND OF
        ILLINOIS,
                                                         Plaintiﬀ-Appellant,
        versus
        MIMEDX GROUP, INC.,
        MICHAEL J. SENKEN,
        PARKER H. PETIT,
        CHERRY BEKAERT LLP,
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        2                         Opinion of the Court                       22-10633

        WILLIAM C. TAYLOR,

                                                             Defendants-Appellees,

        CHRISTOPHER M. CASHMAN,

                                                                          Defendant.

                                ____________________

                      Appeal from the United States District Court
                         for the Northern District of Georgia
                         D.C. Docket No. 1:18-cv-00830-WMR
                               ____________________

        Before ROSENBAUM, LAGOA, Circuit Judges, and WETHERELL, Dis-
        trict Judge.*
        LAGOA, Circuit Judge:
                This appeal asks us to determine whether a series of allega-
        tions made by Carpenters Pension Fund of Illinois sufficiently
        demonstrates loss causation as to its claims under § 10(b) of Secu-
        rities Exchange Act of 1934 (the “Exchange Act”) and Securities and
        Exchange Commission Rule 10b-5 against MiMedx Group, Inc.,

        * Honorable  T. Kent Wetherell, II, United States District Judge, for the North-
        ern District of Florida, sitting by designation.
USCA11 Case: 22-10633      Document: 58-1     Date Filed: 07/10/2023     Page: 3 of 55

        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                        3

        certain former MiMedx corporate executives, and Cherry Bekaert
        LLP at the motion to dismiss stage. The district court dismissed
        Carpenters’s action, finding that none of the complaint’s allega-
        tions occurring before the date Carpenters sold its MiMedx stock
        constituted a partial corrective disclosure sufficient to demonstrate
        loss causation.
               Carpenters contends that the district court erred in its loss
        causation analysis. Carpenters further argues that the district court
        erred in denying its post-judgment motion for relief from judg-
        ment, as well as its post-judgment request for leave to amend its
        complaint. After careful review, and with the benefit of oral argu-
        ment, we conclude that the district court erred in finding that Car-
        penters lacked standing to bring its Exchange Act claims against
        Defendants and vacate that portion of the district court’s order.
        But we affirm the district court’s order dismissing Carpenters’s sec-
        ond amended complaint for failure to plead loss causation. We also
        affirm the district court’s order denying Carpenters’s post-judg-
        ment motion, including the denial of Carpenters’s request for leave
        to amend.
                      I.     RELEVANT BACKGROUND
               At the motion to dismiss stage, we must accept all well-
        pleaded facts contained in the operative complaint as true and con-
        strue all reasonable inferences in the light most favorable to the
        plaintiff. FindWhat Inv. Grp. v. FindWhat.com, 658 F.3d 1282, 1296
        (11th Cir. 2011); Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009).
USCA11 Case: 22-10633         Document: 58-1        Date Filed: 07/10/2023        Page: 4 of 55

        4                         Opinion of the Court                      22-10633

        Accordingly, our discussion of the relevant facts comes from Car-
        penters’s second amended complaint.
                                        A. The Parties
               MiMedx is a Florida corporation headquartered in Marietta,
        Georgia. From April 25, 2013, through November 7, 2018,
        MiMedx’s common stock was publicly traded on the NASDAQ un-
        der the ticker symbol “MDXG.” Parker H. Petit was appointed as
        CEO, President, and Chairman of the Board of Directors of
        MiMedx in 2009. Michael J. Senken was CFO of MiMedx from Jan-
        uary 15, 2010, through June 6, 2018. William C. Taylor joined
        MiMedx on September 22, 2009, as COO and President and later
        became a Director on October 25, 2011. 1 Cherry Bekaert is a certi-
        fied public accounting firm headquartered in Richmond, Virginia,
        with an office in Atlanta, Georgia. The firm served as MiMedx’s
        external auditor for fiscal years 2008 through 2016 and was dis-
        missed by MiMedx on August 4, 2017. For purposes of this appeal,
        we refer to MiMedx, Petit, Senken, and Taylor collectively as the
        “MiMedx Defendants” and refer to the MiMedx Defendants and
        Cherry Bekaert collectively as “Defendants.”
               Carpenters is the lead plaintiff in this consolidated securities
        class action. Carpenters purchased 41,080 shares of MiMedx com-
        mon stock in three separate transactions between August 2017 and
        October 2017, and later sold those shares in December 2017.

        1Petit, Senken, and Taylor were terminated for cause on or effective as of June
        30, 2018.
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        22-10633                 Opinion of the Court                             5

        Carpenters reinvested in MiMedx by purchasing 39,200 shares of
        common stock on January 16, 2018, which it later sold on February
        26, 2018.
                MiMedx is a “leading global supplier of amniotic tissue prod-
        ucts” and “designs, manufactures, and sells products derived from
        human placental tissues . . . donated by mothers after childbirth.”
        “These products are sold in the form of sheets or wraps to be ap-
        plied to a patient’s skin (often referred to as ‘grafts’ or ‘tissues’) or
        in the form of micronized powders to be applied to a patient’s skin
        either topically or by injection.”
                After Petit joined MiMedx, the company acquired a propri-
        etary sterilization process called “PURION,” which “was designed
        to maximize production yield while minimizing processing costs.”
        Using the PURION process, MiMedx developed two commercial
        products during the Class Period 2: EpiFix and AmnioFix. EpiFix is
        a wound care product intended to treat inflammation and various
        types of chronic wounds. AmnioFix is a surgical, sports medicine,
        and orthopedics (“SSO”) product “to treat inflammation, minimize
        scar tissue formation, and treat conditions such as tendonitis, plan-
        tar fasciitis, lateral epicondylitis, medical epicondylitis, bursitis,
        strains, and sprains.” EpiFix is covered by Medicare, Medicaid, and
        private insurance, but AmnioFix is not.

        2 The Class Period is defined as the period from March 7, 2013, through June
        29, 2018.
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        6                      Opinion of the Court                 22-10633

                MiMedx operates a business segment named Regenerative
        Biomaterials that includes all of its products and reports its revenue
        in two separate product categories: Wound Care and SSO. The
        majority of MiMedx’s revenues come from domestic sales to health
        care customers in the United States; its customers can be broken
        down into government customers, e.g., the U.S. Department of
        Veterans Affairs and Department of Defense, and private custom-
        ers, e.g., hospitals, clinics, doctor’s offices.
                               B. Factual Background
                1. General Allegations Relating to the MiMedx Defendants
               After MiMedx acquired PURION, the company reported
        “explosive growth” from the first quarter of 2012 to the third quar-
        ter of 2017, meeting or exceeding revenue guidance in all but one
        of the quarters. For example, in 2016, MiMedx reported annual
        revenue of over $245 million, around a 3,000 percent increase from
        2011.
               But “[u]nbeknownst to investors,” MiMedx’s “remarkable
        growth” and “flawless” performance during the Class Period were
        “predicated on myriad improper and illicit sales and distribution
        practices, as well as a massive accounting fraud perpetrated at the
        behest of its executive leadership.” Defendants “emphasized short-
        term business goals over compliance and ethics,” “purposely took
        action to disregard revenue recognition rules” under Generally Ac-
        cepted Accounting Principles (“GAAP”) and to “manipulate the
        timing and recognition of revenue, acted against employees who
        raised concerns about [MiMedx’s] practices[,] and marginalized
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        22-10633              Opinion of the Court                        7

        [MiMedx’s] legal and accounting departments and advisors.” Dur-
        ing the Class Period, MiMedx trained sales representatives to infil-
        trate, influence, and offer illegal inducements—e.g., free meals and
        paid speeches—to doctors and their staff to encourage the use of
        MiMedx products. MiMedx also employed many unlawful prac-
        tices to guarantee reimbursement for its products from third-party
        payors such as Medicare and Medicaid and manipulated charitable
        donations to subsidize customer use of its products.
                To give the appearance of consistent revenue growth, the
        MiMedx Defendants orchestrated a massive fraudulent scheme, ex-
        ploiting their close relationships with distributors to engage in a
        multitude of improper revenue recognition practices and artifi-
        cially inflate MiMedx’s sales in order to achieve revenue guidance.
        Beginning in 2012, MiMedx partnered with a purportedly inde-
        pendent distributor, AvKARE, Inc., to sell products to the VA. But,
        as later admitted, the MiMedx Defendants had an undisclosed side
        arrangement with AvKARE, which allowed them to maintain con-
        trol over the distribution and sale of products to the VA and which
        they used to stock VA shelves with unordered and unneeded prod-
        uct. As a result, VA shelves were soon “absolutely overflowing,”
        with product “spilling out of every cabinet available,” causing VA
        employees to question MiMedx’s practices. While the MiMedx De-
        fendants planned to “feather[] back” overstocked product as re-
        turns in future reporting periods, there was simply too much prod-
        uct to return without raising red flags or jeopardizing MiMedx’s
        ability to meet quarterly projections. Thus, MiMedx employed
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        8                       Opinion of the Court                   22-10633

        various schemes to conceal excess inventories, avoid product re-
        turns, and “clean up the books.”
               Similar to its arrangement with AvKARE, MiMedx relied on
        several commercial distributors to provide much needed revenue
        injections at the end of quarters. MiMedx had close ties to these
        distributors and leaned on them to take significant quantities of of-
        ten-unneeded product at quarter end so that MiMedx could appear
        to meet its financial guidance. In return for inflating its sales figures
        (and enabling MiMedx to prematurely recognize revenue in viola-
        tion of GAAP), MiMedx provided the distributors with highly fa-
        vorable, off-book terms, including reduced prices, special financ-
        ing, and lax return policies. Through this channel-stuffing scheme,
        MiMedx inflated its financial results by millions of dollars.
                          2. Alleged Partial Corrective Disclosure
               Carpenters contends that, over the course of several years,
        the “truth regarding Defendants’ extensive misconduct leaked into
        the market through a series of partial corrective disclosures, culmi-
        nating in MiMedx’s admission that nearly six years of financial re-
        sults were tainted by fraud, and the forced resignations of Petit,
        Taylor, and Senken for misconduct.” Carpenters further contends
        that the second amended complaint identifies numerous partial
        corrective disclosures between December 31, 2014, and December
        5, 2018, which “caused statistically significant drops in MiMedx’s
        stock price” and allegedly corrected the stock price’s artificial infla-
        tion. These alleged partial corrective disclosures identified by Car-
        penters are:
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        22-10633              Opinion of the Court                       9

                (a) On December 31, 2014, MiMedx issued a press release
        announcing that it received a civil subpoena from the U.S. Depart-
        ment of Health and Human Services in connection with the De-
        partment’s investigation into MiMedx’s sales and marketing activi-
        ties. In this press release, Petit stated:
              I can assure you that the corporate officers at MiMedx
              are not aware of anything that would stimulate this
              . . . investigation. We have continually maintained
              and improved a robust compliance program. We
              have been very focused on the thoroughness of our
              compliance policies and our staff adhering to those
              policies. For instance, MiMedx employees participate
              in a thorough training program regarding our policies
              and the standards that have been established and en-
              forced to assure their understanding and adherence to
              our compliance programs. Employees may convey
              anonymously and directly to senior management and
              our Board of Directors any form of concern, com-
              plaint or inquiry related to our compliance programs
              or other issues. With the significant growth we are
              experiencing, this has been and continues to be an in-
              itiative in which we devote considerable time, atten-
              tion and resources.
              ....
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        10                      Opinion of the Court                   22-10633

               We screen all of our applicants very carefully. With
               respect to former ABH[ 3] applicants, we sought addi-
               tional input from some former ABH corporate man-
               agement who joined MiMedx and who were familiar
               with the suspected violations and the individuals in-
               volved.
               (b) On October 13, 2015, MiMedx hosted an analyst day dur-
        ing which MiMedx discussed parting ways with CPM, its largest
        U.S. commercial distributor. This departure negatively impacted
        MiMedx’s third quarter 2015 figures by $2 million to $3 million.
        According to Carpenters, the subsequent decline in MiMedx’s
        stock price on these days would have been steeper had the MiMedx
        Defendants revealed the “true scope of their fraud and dependence
        on CPM and its network of sub-distributors . . . to facilitate their
        improper sales and distribution practices, including channel stuff-
        ing.”
                (c) On April 10, 2016, “MiMedx issued a press release an-
        nouncing that 1Q16 revenue fell short of forecasted guidance by $2
        million.” On this day, MiMedx recorded its first revenue miss after
        seventeen quarters of meeting or exceeding its revenue guidance.
        Petit stated that the company was disappointed that its revenue
        “fell short of [the] forecasted guidance by about two million dol-
        lars.” According to Carpenters, “Petit misleadingly attributed this
        shortfall to ‘growing pains’ resulting from the initial effects of the

        3ABH is a subsidiary of Shire Pharmaceuticals LLC, which competed with
        MiMedx in the wound care market. MiMedx grew its sales force by acquiring
        sales representatives from ABH.
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        22-10633                Opinion of the Court                          11

        installation of a Sales Management System on the sales organiza-
        tion, the realignment of certain sales management to prepare SSO
        for autonomous growth, and the assimilation of Stability.”4 Petit
        further falsely emphasized that the “first quarter issues resulting in
        our lower than expected revenues are not competitive related or
        systemic to advanced wound care or our SSO business.” But, in
        reality, “the shortfall was the result of [the MiMedx] Defendants’
        systemic channel stuffing practices and fraudulent revenue recog-
        nition scheme catching up to them.”
               (d) On December 15, 2016, Luke Tornquist and Jess Kru-
        choski, former MiMedx employees, “filed a lawsuit against
        MiMedx and Petit for their termination in response to declaring
        concerns about a channel stuffing scheme to inflate revenue.” The
        same day, Petit responded with a press release characterizing their
        allegations as “not factual and fallacious.” Petit also misled the
        market by asserting Kruchoski and Tornquist were terminated due
        to their sale of competitors’ products, not the concerns they raised
        about Defendants’ conduct.”
               (e) On May 23, 2017, Joe Munda, a securities analyst from
        First Analysis, “issued a report concerning the Company’s relation-
        ship with AvKARE,” stating the relationship was “evolving and
        confusing” and MiMedx’s valuation appeared stretched. According

        4In January 2016, MiMedx acquired Stability, a Tennessee-based commercial
        distributor that MiMedx had been using “to help make up for the revenue
        shortfall resulting from the winding down of MiMedx’s relationship with
        CPM.”
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        12                     Opinion of the Court                22-10633

        to Carpenters’s complaint, Munda’s report was based on non-pub-
        lic facts gathered during his investigation into MiMedx, which in-
        cluded conversations with former sales representatives, VA person-
        nel, and other industry participants.
               (f) On September 7, 2017, The Capital Forum issued an article
        reporting on an investigation into MiMedx’s channel stuffing
        scheme at VA facilities. The VA disclosed this investigation when
        it denied a Freedom of Information Act request submitted by The
        Capital Forum based on what the VA described as “an ongoing law
        enforcement investigation.” The same day, MiMedx released a
        press release that allegedly “misleadingly downplayed former em-
        ployees’ channel stuffing allegations, and threatened short sellers
        making arguments based on prior allegations.” Carpenters also al-
        leged that the press release misleadingly claimed that MiMedx was
        not a target of the investigation but instead was assisting in it and
        that none of MiMedx’s executives directed terminated individuals
        to provide gifts and meals to VA employees in violation of federal
        law and MiMedx policies.
               (g) On September 20, 2017, Aurelius Value “issued a report
        questioning MiMedx’s improper channel stuffing in violation of
        GAAP and the Company’s reliance on distributors” based on its re-
        search including communication with a former MiMedx sales rep-
        resentative. Viceroy Research “also issued a 35-page report discuss-
        ing improper kickback and bribery schemes,” based on “non-public
        internal MiMedx documents, including excerpted communications
        between employees, which revealed that improper conduct at
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        22-10633                 Opinion of the Court                            13

        MiMedx was pervasive and directed by senior management.” In
        response, MiMedx issued a press release in which it stated that
        those reports “have virtually no basis in fact, are littered with innu-
        endo and contain many statements that are simply not correct.”
        MiMedx characterized the reports as “a concerted short seller at-
        tack by numerous entities.”
               (h) On September 27, 2017, Aurelius issued a report claiming
        that MiMedx’s second audit committee investigation,5 which con-
        cluded on March 1, 2017, and had determined that MiMedx had not
        engaged in any wrongdoing, was not independent because mem-
        bers on the committee had “longstanding ties to” MiMedx and
        Petit, contrary to Petit’s statements touting the independence of
        the investigation. Two days later, MiMedx issued a press release in
        response, in which Petit stated:
               I encourage all MiMedx shareholders to thoroughly
               review and consider our document posted today on
               our website. As you are aware, MiMedx and all other
               public companies are governed by federal regulations
               prohibiting the dissemination of false and misleading
               information about the Company; unfortunately, or-
               ganizations like Viceroy Research and Aurelius Value
               are not held to those standards and often such

        5 MiMedx’s audit committee  had conducted a previous investigation from late
        2015 to early 2016 based on a complaint from MiMedx’s former Controller,
        Mark Andersen. This first audit committee investigation ended in February
        2016, with the audit committee concluding that Andersen’s allegations lacked
        merit.
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        14                     Opinion of the Court                 22-10633

              organizations have little to no accountability for the
              misinformation they publish. Both the Viceroy Re-
              search report and the Aurelius Value report indicate
              that either they are short in MDXG, or that the reader
              should assume they are short in MDXG.
               (i) On October 23, 2017, Munda issued a report “concerning
        MiMedx excluding its analysts from asking questions on calls and
        noting unanswered questions about its dealings with the VA.”
        Munda suspended his price target for MiMedx. The next day, Cit-
        ron Research “posted a video on YouTube concerning [MiMedx’s]
        use of third parties to inflate financials,” based on existing and new
        research.
               (j) On November 16, 2017, Viceroy issued a report “reveal-
        ing, among other things, that MiMedx fraudulently exploited the
        insurance reimbursement system by manipulating the insurance
        codes used for medical procedures involving MiMedx products.”
        The “report revealed that MiMedx sent legal material to its former
        employees requesting that they not contact regulatory agencies, in-
        cluded in its settlement terms that the former employees retract
        prior statements in direct violation of federal regulations, and hid
        its improper conduct on confidentiality grounds.”
               (k) On November 20, 2017, MiMedx issued a press release
        responding to the recent short seller reports, including Viceroy’s.
        According to Carpenters, this press release caught the market’s at-
        tention and raised concerns given MiMedx’s “unorthodox defense”
        and “significant time and resources” devoted to the growing alle-
        gations of fraudulent conduct.
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        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                         15

               (l) On February 15, 2018, Aurelius issued an “Open Letter to
        the MiMedx Auditors” regarding improper accounting practices
        amounting to a “serious and pervasive fraud.” Aurelius’s letter also
        stated that MiMedx was filling shelves before the end of quarters
        with excess product that neither AvKARE nor the VA had re-
        quested in order to hit sales targets and that Aurelius’s letter relied
        on “exhaustive forensic research.”
               (m) On February 20, 2018, MiMedx announced a third audit
        committee investigation and the postponement of its 2017 Form
        10-K. MiMedx explained that this investigation was “an internal
        investigation into current and prior-period matters relating to alle-
        gations regarding certain sales and distribution practices at the
        Company,” including “the accounting treatment of certain distrib-
        utor contracts.” But, according to Carpenters, MiMedx continued
        to mislead investors by stating that “based on information available
        to date . . . the outcome of such investigation should not have a
        material impact on revenue guidance for 2018.”
              (n) On February 22, 2018, “The Wall Street Journal reported
        improper payments to more than 20 doctors for the use of MiMedx
        products.” MiMedx held a conference call the next day “wherein
        the Company downplayed the delay in the filing of its 2017 Form
        10-K but expressed uncertainty in the timeframe” for the third audit
        committee investigation. On the call, Petit stated that the
        timeframe for the investigation’s completion had not been deter-
        mined, and Taylor stated that MiMedx’s management was not in
        control of the audit committee’s timeline and that the committee’s
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        16                     Opinion of the Court                22-10633

        investigation involved “current and prior period [] matters” and
        “sales and distributor practices.” Also on the call, the MiMedx De-
        fendants stated that they “certainly believe you can expect our rev-
        enue growth to continue at a rapid rate,” that MiMedx’s revenue
        guidance for the year would be from $383 to 387 million,” and that
        its “cash flow remains very strong.” Petit claimed that MiMedx
        was a victim of “illegal short-sellers with a value destructive
        agenda” while Taylor claimed that the third audit committee in-
        vestigation would not affect “operational performance” and that
        MiMedx was experiencing “rapid growth.”
               As noted above, Carpenters did not own any MiMedx stock
        after February 26, 2018. Carpenters, however, alleges that the fol-
        lowing events occurring during the Class Period were partial cor-
        rective disclosures relevant to its claims.
               On February 26, 2018, a Bloomberg article disclosed a Depart-
        ment of Justice (“DOJ”) investigation into MiMedx for overcharg-
        ing the government for its products and into MiMedx’s distribution
        practices.
                In response to the Bloomberg article, on February 27, 2018,
        MiMedx released a “misleading press release” stating it was una-
        ware of any DOJ investigation, denying the Bloomberg allegations
        as an illegal short selling attack since September 2017, and claiming
        that terminated employees were retaliating by acting in concert
        with the short sellers. MiMedx directed news writers to its “effec-
        tive” rebuttals of the allegations. Its press release also reassured
        investors that the accusations should not affect performance and
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        22-10633                  Opinion of the Court                              17

        that “management remains confident in the Company’s ability to
        deliver operational and clinical success in the months and years to
        come.”
                On March 15, 2018, MiMedx admitted it was under investi-
        gation by the DOJ, but on the same day, MiMedx issued a press
        release in which Petit provided “misleadingly positive statements”
        about MiMedx’s financial performance. Next, on April 26, 2018,
        MiMedx issued another misleading press release, stating that it was
        enjoying overwhelmingly strong sales and financial results and that
        it was raising revenue guidance. On May 8, 2018, “the DOJ re-
        leased a statement that a federal grand jury returned [an indictment
        of VA employees] for conspiracy to commit health care fraud in-
        volving benefits received from MiMedx employees.” On June 7,
        2018, MiMedx disclosed that nearly six years of financials were ma-
        terially incorrect, requiring their restatement and also announced
        that Senken departed the company. Then, on July 2, 2018,
        “MiMedx disclosed that Petit and Taylor resigned from their posi-
        tions,” linking the resignations to findings from the third audit
        committee investigation.6

        6 In 2019, Petit and Taylor were charged via indictment with one count of
        securities fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud, make
        false SEC filings, and obstruct MiMedx’s auditor. See Indictment, United States
        v. Petit, No. 19-cr-850-JSR (S.D.N.Y. Nov. 25, 2019), ECF No. 1. The charges
        concerned transactions in 2015 with four MiMedx distributors. Id. Petit was
        convicted of securities fraud but acquitted of conspiracy; Taylor was acquitted
        of securities fraud but convicted of conspiracy. Jury Verdict, Petit (S.D.N.Y.
        Nov. 19, 2020), ECF No. 121. The SEC has also filed a civil enforcement action
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        18                       Opinion of the Court                    22-10633

                          3. Allegations Specific to Cherry Bekaert
               Carpenters alleged that Cherry Bekaert “repeatedly issued
        clean audit opinions concerning the accuracy of MiMedx’s financial
        statements and the effectiveness of” MiMedx’s internal control
        over financial reporting (“ICFR”), which were relied upon by in-
        vestors. But despite Cherry Bekaert’s original certifications and au-
        dit opinions, MiMedx’s financial statements for the fiscal years end-
        ing in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016 were materially misstated
        and did not comply with GAAP. And contrary to Cherry Bekaert’s
        assertion, MiMedx’s ICFR was not effective for those years. Ac-
        cording to Carpenters, Cherry Bekaert consistently failed to con-
        duct its audits in accordance with the Public Company Account
        Oversight Board (“PCAOB”) standards because it did not:
        “properly plan and perform its audits to address key fraud risks, in-
        cluding revenue recognition; exercise due care or professional
        skepticism; obtain sufficient competent evidential matter; appro-
        priately test related party transactions and potential illegal acts;
        properly assess the Company’s ICFR; or identify areas of material
        weakness.” Nor did Cherry Bekaert exercise professional skepti-
        cism and expand the scope of the audits, and its reckless disregard
        of MiMedx’s red flags was evidenced by Ernst & Young LLP subse-
        quently raising serious questions about MiMedx’s revenue recog-
        nition and the adequacy of the first two audit committee investiga-
        tions.

        against Petit, Taylor, and Senken, which remains pending. See SEC v. MiMedx
        Grp., Inc., No. 1:19-cv-10927-NRB (S.D.N.Y. Nov. 26, 2019).
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        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                       19

                In particular, Carpenters complaint alleged that “Cherry
        Bekaert violated PCAOB standards either by failing to identify the
        fraud risk of improper revenue recognition in planning its audit or
        by failing to perform required auditing procedures to address the
        risk.” It did not appropriately audit sales to AvKARE and others.
        Nor did it abide by related party auditing standards during the Class
        Period. It also ignored red flags associated with whistleblower
        complaints and the first two audit committee investigations.
               Carpenters contended that the MiMedx Defendants’ misrep-
        resentations did not absolve Cherry Bekaert of liability because
        Cherry Bekaert failed “to follow up on significant red flags associ-
        ated with the misrepresented sales transactions, and it placed un-
        due reliance on management representations over independent,
        third-party evidence.” Carpenters also contended that Cherry
        Bekaert’s clean audit opinions certifying the accuracy of MiMedx’s
        financial statements and the effectiveness of MiMedx’s ICFR for the
        years 2012 to 2016 were false and misleading statements, given that
        those statements could not be relied on and had to be restated and
        that the ICFR were ineffective.
              On August 4, 2017, MiMedx replaced Cherry Bekaert with
        Ernst & Young. Carpenters asserts that this replacement happened
        in “the midst of the unraveling fraud, including investigations,
        whistleblower litigation, and the SEC’s request for . . . findings”
        from the second audit committee investigation.
                           C. District Court Proceedings
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        20                      Opinion of the Court                  22-10633

               On February 23, 2018, Norman MacPhee filed a securities
        fraud class action suit against MiMedx, Senken, and Petit. Carpen-
        ters moved, pursuant to the Private Securities Litigation Reform
        Act of 1995, to consolidate MacPhee’s action and a separate action
        filed by Matthew Kline. Carpenters also moved to be appointed
        lead plaintiff for the putative class. On January 16, 2019, the district
        court granted Carpenters’s motion.
                After its appointment as lead plaintiff, Carpenters filed a con-
        solidated complaint. Defendants filed four separate motions to dis-
        miss that complaint. While those motions were pending, the par-
        ties agreed, with the district court’s approval, that Carpenters could
        file the second amended complaint, which is the operative com-
        plaint in this case.
               In the second amended complaint, Carpenters brought the
        following claims on behalf of the putative class: (1) Count I for vi-
        olations of § 10(b) of the Exchange Act, 15 U.S.C. § 78j(b), and Rule
        10b-5 promulgated under that Act, 17 C.F.R. § 240.10b-5(b), against
        the MiMedx Defendants; (2) Count II for violations of § 10(b) and
        Rule 10b-5 against Cherry Bekaert; and (3) Count III for violations
        of § 20(a) of the Exchange Act against Petit, Taylor, and Senken.
        The putative class consisted of “all persons or entities that pur-
        chased or otherwise acquired the publicly traded common stock of
        MiMedx between March 7, 2013 and June 29, 2018, inclusive, and
        who were damaged thereby,” excluding Defendants, the officers
        and directors of MiMedx, members of their immediate families,
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        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                         21

        and their legal representatives, heirs, successors, or assigns, and any
        entity in which Defendants have or had a controlling interest.
                As to loss causation—the primary issue on appeal—Carpen-
        ters alleged that the “timing and magnitude” of the decline in price
        of MiMedx common stock in response to the alleged “partial dis-
        closures” discussed above negated any inference that the losses suf-
        fered by Carpenters “were caused by changed market conditions,
        macroeconomic or industry factors, or Company-specific facts un-
        related to Defendants’ fraudulent conduct.” Carpenters noted that
        there was clear divergence of MiMedx’s company stock price com-
        pared to the NASDAQ Composite Index, as well as the NASDAQ
        Biotechnology Index. It alleged that the price drops in MiMedx
        stock would have been more significant “if the full truth regarding
        MiMedx’s improper sales and distribution practices and fraudulent
        revenue scheme had been known.” But Carpenters claimed that
        the “Defendants continued to make false and misleading state-
        ments downplaying, denying, and concealing the fraud in order to
        maintain an appearance of the Company’s legitimacy and to artifi-
        cially prop up its stock price.” And “the rapid declines,” once the
        “truth was revealed,” “served to remove artificial inflation from the
        price of MiMedx common stock, and were direct and foreseeable
        consequences of the revelation of the falsity of Defendants’ Class
        Period misrepresentations and omissions to the market and a ma-
        terialization of the risks concealed by Defendants’ fraud.” As a re-
        sult, Carpenters and the class suffered true economic losses that
        were a direct and proximate result of Defendants’ fraudulent
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        22                     Opinion of the Court                  22-10633

        scheme, misrepresentations, and omissions that artificially inflated
        the stock.
                Defendants all moved to dismiss the second amended com-
        plaint. The MiMedx Defendants argued that Carpenters lacked
        standing and could not plead loss causation because no corrective
        disclosure of the alleged fraud occurred before Carpenters sold all
        of its MiMedx stock in February 2018. They asserted that Carpen-
        ters could not have it “both ways” by simultaneously arguing that
        a misstatement itself constituted a corrective disclosure. As to the
        news articles and analyst reports cited by Carpenters, they stated
        that those reports were obtained from information already in the
        public domain and thus were not corrective because they did not
        disclose new information. As to the lawsuits and investigations al-
        leged in the second amended complaint, they argued that the com-
        mencement of an investigation, without more, is insufficient under
        this Court’s precedent to constitute a corrective disclosure. And
        because there were no corrective disclosures alleged prior to Car-
        penters selling all of its stock, the MiMedx Defendants argued that
        Carpenters’s investment losses were wholly unrelated to the mis-
        representations alleged in the second amended complaint. Cherry
        Bekaert adopted the MiMedx Defendants’ arguments while assert-
        ing other grounds for dismissal.
                The district court dismissed the second amended complaint.
        In its order, the district court explained that in order to have stand-
        ing Carpenters was required to plausibly allege a causal connection
        between its injury and Defendants’ challenged actions. As relevant
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        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                         23

        here, the district court found that Carpenters could not establish
        loss causation because it sold all of its MiMedx stock before any
        corrective disclosure revealed to the market the falsity of a prior
        statement.
               In reaching its conclusion, the district court explained that
        the second amended complaint alleged fifteen “partial disclosures”
        before Carpenters sold its stock, which fell into three categories: (1)
        allegedly misleading disclosures by MiMedx; (2) news articles and
        analyst reports; and (3) lawsuit and investigation announcements.
        As to the first category, the district court found that Carpenters was
        improperly relying on the disclosures to be both misstatements and
        corrective disclosures. The district court also found that those dis-
        closures did not reveal the pertinent truth regarding the alleged
        fraudulent conduct.
                As to the second category, the district court found that the
        reports and articles “only repeated information that was already in
        the public domain.” But, the district court reasoned, a corrective
        disclosure requires disclosure of new information; the repackaging
        of already-public information by an analyst was insufficient to con-
        stitute a corrective disclosure.
               As to the third category, the district court explained that the
        investigation announcements, without more, were not corrective
        disclosures because they did not reveal to the market that the com-
        pany’s previous statements were false or fraudulent. While stock
        prices may fall as a result of such announcements, the court rea-
        soned that the decline in stock price is due to the investigation or
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        24                     Opinion of the Court                  22-10633

        lawsuit potentially being seen as adding a risk of future corrective
        action. While Carpenters argued that the announcements were
        corrective because they were followed “by related disclosures that
        further informed investors of Defendants’ actual wrongdoing,” the
        district court declined to apply language from a footnote in our de-
        cision in Meyer v. Greene, 710 F.3d 1189, 1201 n.13 (11th Cir. 2013),
        which hypothesized that “[i]t may be possible, in a different case,
        for the disclosure of an SEC investigation to qualify as a partial cor-
        rective disclosure . . . when the investigation is coupled with a later
        finding of fraud or wrongdoing.” As such, the district court deter-
        mined that the announcements regarding (1) the lawsuit by former
        employees, (2) the government investigations, and (3) MiMedx’s
        own internal investigation cannot be considered corrective disclo-
        sures because they only reveal the risk of a future corrective disclo-
        sure and are not corrective themselves.
               Turning to standing, the district court stated that Carpenters
        must sufficiently allege “that the fraud-induced inflation that was
        baked into the purchase price of the MiMedx stock was subse-
        quently removed from the stock’s price by a corrective disclosure,
        thereby causing the loss.” But, the district court explained, when
        the shares are sold before the pertinent truth regarding the repre-
        sentations is revealed through a corrective disclosure, the losses are
        not attributable to the misrepresentations. The district court found
        that because there were no corrective disclosures before Carpen-
        ters sold all of its MiMedx common stock, Carpenters’s investment
        losses were not fairly traceable to the alleged misrepresentations,
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        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                       25

        as the artificial inflation was still “baked into” the stock’s price
        when Carpenters sold its shares.
               Carpenters subsequently filed a motion for relief from judg-
        ment and for leave to amend pursuant to Federal Rules of Civil
        Procedure 59(e), 60(b), and 15(a)(2). Carpenters argued that in dis-
        missing its claims the district court erred in focusing solely on the
        pre-February 26, 2018, disclosures because when “a complaint al-
        leges that the undisclosed truth leaked out over time, the court
        must cumulatively analyze the series of partial disclosures alleged
        to determine whether loss causation was adequately pled, rather
        than engage in an individual analysis of each distinct disclosure.”
        Carpenters also argued that the district court mischaracterized
        some of the alleged disclosures, particularly those involving the in-
        vestigations, and improperly applied this Court’s decision in Meyer.
        Alternatively, Carpenters sought leave to amend the second
        amended complaint to add additional allegations and add an addi-
        tional plaintiff—Amalgamated Bank, an investor that held MiMedx
        shares through the end of the Class Period.
                The district court denied Carpenters’s post-judgment mo-
        tion. The district court found that the motion failed under Rule
        59(e) because Carpenters predominately raised the same argu-
        ments it had raised in support of the second amended complaint.
        As to Rule 60(b), the district court rejected Carpenters’s argument
        that it had misapplied the law. Further, the district court denied
        Carpenters’s motion for leave to amend, explaining that because
        Carpenters waited until after judgment was entered to seek such
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        26                        Opinion of the Court                   22-10633

        relief, Rule 15(a) did not apply and that because Carpenters was not
        entitled to relief under Rule 59(e) or 60(b), it was not entitled to
        leave to amend post-judgment.
               This appeal ensued.
                         II.      STANDARDS OF REVIEW
                Whether a plaintiff has standing to sue is a threshold juris-
        dictional question that we review de novo. Muransky v. Godiva Choc-
        olatier, Inc., 979 F.3d 917, 924 (11th Cir. 2020) (en banc).
                We also review de novo a district court’s order dismissing a
        complaint. FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1295. We “must accept as true
        all of the [factual] allegations contained in a complaint,” but we
        “are not bound to accept as true a legal conclusion couched as a
        factual allegation.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v.
        Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007)). “To survive a motion to dis-
        miss, the complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, ac-
        cepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.’”
        Id. (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570). “A claim has facial plausi-
        bility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court
        to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the
        misconduct alleged.” Id. While the plausibility standard is not akin
        to a “probability requirement,” it requires “more than a sheer pos-
        sibility that a defendant has acted unlawfully.” Id.
               We review the denial of a motion to alter or amend a judg-
        ment under Rules 59(e) and 60(b), as well as the denial of a motion
        for leave to amend, for abuse of discretion. Shuford v. Fid. Nat’l
        Prop. & Cas. Ins. Co., 508 F.3d 1337, 1341 (11th Cir. 2007) (Rule
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        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                        27

        59(e)); Arthur v. Thomas, 739 F.3d 611, 628 (11th Cir. 2014) (Rule
        60(b)); Rosenberg v. Gould, 554 F.3d 962, 965 (11th Cir. 2009) (motion
        for leave to amend).
                                 III.    ANALYSIS
               We divide our discussion into three parts. First, we address
        the threshold issue of whether Carpenters had standing to bring its
        claims under the Exchange Act. Second, we determine whether
        Carpenters plausibly pleaded loss causation as to its Exchange Act
        claims in the second amended complaint. Finally, we address
        whether the district court erred in denying Carpenters’s post-judg-
        ment motions under Rules 59(e) and 60(b), including its request for
        leave to amend the second amended complaint under Rule
        15(a)(2).
                                        A. Standing
                Article III of the United States Constitution limits federal
        courts to deciding “Cases” or “Controversies.” U.S. Const. art. III,
        § 2. “To have a case or controversy, a litigant must establish that
        he has standing.” Ga. Ass’n of Latino Elected Offs., Inc. v. Gwinnett
        Cnty. Bd. of Registration & Elections (“GALEO”), 36 F.4th 1100, 1113
        (11th Cir. 2022) (quoting United States v. Amodeo, 916 F.3d 967, 971
        (11th Cir. 2019)). To establish Article III standing, the plaintiff
        “must show (i) that he suffered an injury in fact that is concrete,
        particularized, and actual or imminent; (ii) that the injury was
        likely caused by the defendant; and (iii) that the injury would likely
        be redressed by judicial relief.” TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, 141 S.
        Ct. 2190, 2203 (2021). Additionally, in the context of a class action,
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        28                      Opinion of the Court                   22-10633

        “if none of the named plaintiffs purporting to represent a class es-
        tablishes the requisite of a case or controversy with the defendants,
        none may seek relief on behalf of himself or any other member of
        the class.” A&M Gerber Chiropractic LLC v. GEICO Gen. Ins. Co., 925
        F.3d 1205, 1211 (11th Cir. 2019) (quoting O’Shea v. Littleton, 414 US.
        488, 494 (1974)). Indeed, “a plaintiff cannot include class action al-
        legations in a complaint and expect to be relieved of personally
        meeting the requirements of constitutional standing, even if the
        persons described in the class definition would have standing them-
        selves to sue.” Id. (quoting Griffin v. Dugger, 823 F.2d 1476, 1483
        (11th Cir. 1987)); see also Focus on the Family v. Pinellas Suncoast
        Transit Auth., 344 F.3d 1263, 1275 (11th Cir. 2003) (collecting cases
        and explaining that this Court has an obligation to assure itself that
        a plaintiff has Article III standing at the outset of litigation but that
        standing does not have to be maintained throughout all stages of
        litigation). Further, “Article III standing must be determined as of
        the time that the Plaintiff’s complaint is filed.” A&M, 925 F.3d at
        1212.
               The disputed element of Article III standing at issue here is
        traceability, i.e., that the injury was likely caused by the defendant.
        As we have stated, in evaluating Article III’s “traceability” require-
        ment, the plaintiff’s injury must be “fairly traceable to the chal-
        lenged action of the defendant, and not the result of the independ-
        ent action of some third party not before the court.” GALEO, 36
        F.4th at 1115 (quoting Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560–
        61 (1992)). Traceability, along with the other elements of standing,
        is “determined at the time the plaintiff’s complaint is filed.”
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        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                         29

        GALEO, 36 F.4th at 1113 (quoting Arcia v. Fla. Sec’y of State, 772 F.3d
        1335, 1340 (11th Cir. 2014)). In examining the traceability of the
        plaintiff’s injury to the defendant’s conduct, “we are concerned
        with something less than the concept of ‘proximate cause,’” as, “for
        standing purposes,” a plaintiff “is not required to prove causation
        beyond a reasonable doubt or by clear and convincing evidence.”
        Focus on the Family, 344 F.3d at 1273 (emphasis removed); accord
        Cordoba v. DIRECTV, LLC, 942 F.3d 1259, 1271 (11th Cir. 2019)
        (“We've made it clear that the traceability requirement is less strin-
        gent than proximate cause.”). “Instead, even harms that flow indi-
        rectly from the action in question can be said to be ‘fairly traceable’
        to that action for standing purposes.” Focus on the Family, 344 F.3d
        at 1273. In other words, “standing is not defeated merely because
        the alleged injury can be fairly traced to the actions of both parties
        and non-parties.” Loggerhead Turtle v. Cnty. Council of Volusia Cnty.,
        Fla., 148 F.3d 1231, 1247 (11th Cir. 1998).
                In its dismissal order, the district court found that Carpen-
        ters’s investment losses were not fairly traceable to Defendants’ al-
        leged misrepresentations because “the artificial inflation caused by
        the misrepresentations was still ‘baked into’ the stock’s price”
        when Carpenters sold its stock, meaning that Carpenters’s loss was
        wholly unrelated to the alleged misrepresentations. In other
        words, the district court concluded that, because Carpenters failed
        to plausibly plead loss causation as to its claims under § 10(b) of the
        Exchange Act, it failed to establish traceability for purposes of Arti-
        cle III standing.
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        30                      Opinion of the Court                   22-10633

                We conclude that the district court erred in finding that Car-
        penters lacked standing at the time it filed its suit as to its § 10(b)
        claims. The district court appears to have equated a failure to ade-
        quately allege an element of a cause of action and thus a failure to
        state a claim with the nonexistence of a “Case” or “Controversy”
        for purposes of Article III standing. But they are not the same. And
        while a plaintiff may both lack standing and fail to state a claim, it
        is also true that a plaintiff can meet the requirement for constitu-
        tional standing but nonetheless fail to state a claim. For example,
        in Meyer, despite concluding that the plaintiff failed to adequately
        allege loss causation—a conclusion we reach here as well—we did
        not dismiss for lack of standing, but instead for failure to state a
        claim. 710 F.3d at 1196–202; see also Moody v. Holman, 887 F.3d
        1281, 1285 (11th Cir. 2018) (explaining that courts “must not ‘con-
        fuse weakness on the merits with the absence of Article III stand-
        ing’” (quoting Ariz. State Legislature v. Ariz. Indep. Redistricting
        Comm’n, 576 U.S. 787, 800 (2015))).
                Put very broadly, for purposes of a standing analysis, a court
        will generally accept the allegations that a defendant’s actions were
        wrong and then ask whether a particular plaintiff’s rights were vi-
        olated by them. While there are certainly nuances and exceptions
        to this broad characterization, when Carpenters filed its complaint,
        it had standing to bring its § 10(b) claims. Carpenters alleged it suf-
        fered a decrease in the value of its MiMedx shares that was caused
        by—or fairly traceable to—Defendants’ allegedly misleading state-
        ments and actions about MiMedx. Taken as true, the allegations
        sufficiently satisfy our test for Article III’s traceability requirement.
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        22-10633                      Opinion of the Court                            31

        And Carpenters’s loss would likely be redressed by a ruling in its
        favor.
                We now turn to the merits of this appeal.
                                         B. Loss Causation
               Carpenters’s claims against Defendants in this case are based
        on § 10(b) of the Exchange Act7 and Rule 10b-5 promulgated there-
        under. 8 To state a claim under § 10(b), a plaintiff must plausibly
        allege the following elements: “(1) a material misrepresentation or
        omission by the defendant; (2) scienter; (3) a connection between
        the misrepresentation or omission and the purchase or sale of a se-
        curity; (4) reliance upon the misrepresentation or omission; (5)

        7 Section   10(b), codified at 15 U.S.C. § 78j(b), provides:
                It shall be unlawful for any person, directly or indirectly, by
                the use of any means or instrumentality of interstate com-
                merce or of the mails, or of any facility of any national securi-
                ties exchange . . .
                (b) To use or employ, in connection with the purchase or sale
                of any security registered on a national securities exchange or
                any security not so registered, or any securities-based swap
                agreement1 any manipulative or deceptive device or contriv-
                ance in contravention of such rules and regulations as the
                Commission may prescribe as necessary or appropriate in the
                public interest or for the protection of investors.
        8Rule 10b-5, in relevant part, provides that “[i]t shall be unlawful for any per-
        son . . . [t]o make any untrue statement of a material fact or to omit to state a
        material fact necessary in order to make the statements made, in the light of
        the circumstances under which they were made, not misleading.” 17 C.F.R.
        § 240.10b-5.
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        32                     Opinion of the Court                   22-10633

        economic loss; and (6) loss causation.” Matrixx Initiatives, Inc. v.
        Siracusano, 563 U.S. 27, 37–38 (2011) (quoting Stoneridge Inv. Part-
        ners, LLC v. Scientific-Atlanta, Inc., 552 U.S. 148, 157 (2008)).
               Carpenters’s claims rely on a “fraud-on-the-market” theory
        of causation. Fraud-on-the-market claims arise from the efficient
        market hypothesis, which provides that “in an open and developed
        securities market, the price of a company’s stock is determined by
        the available material information regarding the company and its
        business.” FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1309–10 (quoting Basic Inc. v. Lev-
        inson, 485 U.S. 224, 241 (1988)). “[A]n efficient capital market rap-
        idly and efficiently digests all available information and translates
        that information into ‘the processed form of a market price,’” as
        millions of stock shares change hands daily and “a critical mass of
        ‘market makers’ study the available information and influence the
        stock prices through trades and recommendations.” Id. at 1310
        (quoting Basic, 485 U.S. at 243–44, 248).
               “A ‘fraud on the market’ occurs when a material misrepre-
        sentation is knowingly disseminated to an informationally efficient
        market.” Id. As we explained in FindWhat:
              Just as an efficient market translates all available truth-
              ful information into the stock price, the market pro-
              cesses the publicly disseminated falsehood and prices it
              into the stock as well. The market price of the stock
              will then include an artificial “inflationary” value—
              the amount that the market mistakenly attributes to
              the stock based on the fraudulent misinformation. So
              long as the falsehood remains uncorrected, it will
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        22-10633                Opinion of the Court                          33

               continue to taint the total mix of available public in-
               formation, and the market will continue to attribute
               the artificial inflation to the stock, day after day. If
               and when the misinformation is finally corrected by
               the release of truthful information (often called a
               “corrective disclosure”), the market will recalibrate
               the stock price to account for this change in infor-
               mation, eliminating whatever artificial value it had at-
               tributed to the price.
        Id. (emphasis in original) (citations omitted).
                The central issue in this appeal is the loss causation element
        of Carpenters’s § 10(b) claims. The loss causation element “re-
        quires that the defendant’s fraud be both the but-for and proximate
        cause of the plaintiff’s later losses.” Id. at 1309. To establish loss
        causation for a § 10(b) claim, “a plaintiff must offer ‘proof of a
        causal connection between the misrepresentation and the invest-
        ment’s subsequent decline in value.’” Meyer, 710 F.3d at 1195
        (quoting Robbins v. Koger Props., Inc., 116 F.3d 1441, 1448 (11th Cir.
        1997)); accord 15 U.S.C. § 78u-4(b). Stated another way, in a fraud
        on the market theory like the one Carpenters proceeds under here,
        “the plaintiff must prove not only that a fraudulent misrepresenta-
        tion artificially inflated the security’s value but also that ‘the fraud-
        induced inflation that was baked into the plaintiff’s purchase price
        was subsequently removed from the stock’s price, thereby causing
        losses to the plaintiff.’” Id. (quoting Hubbard v. BankAtlantic Ban-
        corp., Inc., 688 F.3d 713, 725 (11th Cir. 2012)).
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        34                      Opinion of the Court                  22-10633

                 At the pleading stage, “it should not prove burdensome for
        a plaintiff who has suffered an economic loss to provide a defend-
        ant with some indication of the loss and the causal connection that
        the plaintiff has in mind.” Dura Pharms., Inc. v. Broudo, 544 U.S. 336,
        347 (2005). But while “the plaintiff need not show that the defend-
        ant’s misconduct was the ‘sole and exclusive cause’” of its injury, it
        must show that “the defendant’s act was a ‘substantial’ or ‘signifi-
        cant contributing cause’” of the loss. FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1309
        (quoting Robbins, 116 F.3d at 1447). For example, when a plaintiff
        purchases stock shares at an artificially inflated price attributed to
        fraudulent misrepresentations, and the plaintiff subsequently sells
        those shares at a lower price, the loss the plaintiff suffered from that
        lower price, in and of itself, is not dispositive of loss causation. See
        Dura, 544 U.S. at 342 (“Normally, in cases such as this one
        (i.e., fraud-on-the-market cases), an inflated purchase price will not
        itself constitute or proximately cause the relevant economic loss.”);
        see also Meyer, 710 F.3d at 1195. Rather, it must be determined
        whether the lower price reflects a “corrective disclosure” of the
        fraud or a misrepresentation—in which case, there is loss causa-
        tion—or, instead, reflects “changed economic circumstances,
        changed investor expectations, new industry-specific or firm-spe-
        cific facts, conditions, or other events, which taken separately or
        together account for some or all of that lower price.” Meyer, 710
        F.3d at 1196 (quoting Dura, 544 U.S. at 342). Therefore, “[b]y en-
        suring that only losses actually attributable to a given misrepresen-
        tation are cognizable, the loss causation requirement ensures that
        the federal securities laws do not ‘becom[e] a system of investor
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        22-10633                Opinion of the Court                         35

        insurance that reimburses investors for any decline in the value of
        their investments.’” Id. (second alteration in original) (quoting Rob-
        bins, 116 F.3d 1447).
                Turning to the requirements for a plaintiff to demonstrate
        loss causation in a fraud-on-the-market case, the plaintiff must: (1)
        identify a “corrective disclosure,” i.e., “a release of information that
        reveals to the market the pertinent truth that was previously con-
        cealed or obscured by the company’s fraud”; (2) show that the
        stock’s price dropped soon after that corrective disclosure; and (3)
        eliminate other possible explanations for the price drop, such that
        “the factfinder can infer that it is more probable than not that it was
        the corrective disclosure—as opposed to other possible depressive
        factors—that caused at least a ‘substantial’ amount of the price
        drop.” Id. at 1196–97 (quoting FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1311–12). Ad-
        ditionally, the plaintiff “need not rely on a single, complete correc-
        tive disclosure; rather, it is possible to show that the truth gradually
        leaked out into the marketplace ‘through a series of partial disclo-
        sures.’” Id. at 1197 (quoting Lormand v. U.S. Unwired, Inc., 565 F.3d
        228, 261 (5th Cir. 2009)). Corrective disclosure “can come from any
        source” and “take any form from which the market can absorb [the
        information] and react,” so long as the disclosures “‘reveal[ed] to
        the market the falsity’ of the prior misstatements.’” FindWhat, 658
        F.3d at 1311 n.28 (first alteration in original) (first quoting Matthew
        L. Fry, Pleading and Proving Loss Causation in Fraud-on-the-Market-
        Based Securities Suits Post-Dura Pharmaceuticals, 36 Sec. Reg. L.J. 31,
        64–71 (2008); then quoting Lentell v. Merrill Lynch & Co., 396 F.3d
        161, 175 n.4 (2d Cir. 2005)). Thus, the following question is critical
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        36                      Opinion of the Court                    22-10633

        to the loss causation analysis: “even if the plaintiffs paid an inflated
        price for the stock as a result of the fraud (i.e., even if the plaintiffs
        relied), did the relevant truth eventually come out and thereby
        cause the plaintiffs to suffer losses?” Meyer, 710 F.3d at 1197 (quot-
        ing FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1312).
                Other principles also guide us in determining whether a dis-
        closure is “corrective.” For a disclosure to be “corrective,” it “need
        not precisely mirror the earlier misrepresentation, but it must at
        least relate back to the misrepresentation and not to some other
        negative information about the company.” Id. (quoting In re Wil-
        liams Sec. Litig.–WCG Subclass, 558 F.3d 1130, 1140 (10th Cir. 2009));
        accord FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1311 n.28 (explaining that, to qualify
        as a corrective disclosure, it “must share the same subject matter as
        the prior misstatement; only then can the disclosure be said to have
        a ‘corrective effect,’ rather than merely a ‘negative effect’”). Indeed,
        if events or information that are “not the subject of the misrepre-
        sentation” cause a stock’s price to drop, “the investor has still suf-
        fered no loss on account of the misrepresentation . . . because the
        fraud-induced inflation is still priced into the shares.” Meyer, 710
        F.3d at 1196.
               Additionally, “because a corrective disclosure must reveal a
        previously concealed truth, it obviously must disclose new infor-
        mation, and cannot be merely confirmatory.” FindWhat, 658 F.3d
        at 1311 n.28. This is because the “efficient market theory . . . posits
        that all publicly available information about a security is reflected
        in the market price of the security.” Meyer, 710 F.3d at 1197
USCA11 Case: 22-10633      Document: 58-1      Date Filed: 07/10/2023     Page: 37 of 55

        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                         37

        (quoting Thompson v. RelationService Media, Inc., 610 F.3d 628, 691
        (11th Cir. 2010) (Tjoflat, J., concurring in part and dissenting in
        part)). And “[a] corollary of the efficient market hypothesis is that
        disclosure of confirmatory information—or information already
        known by the market—will not cause a change in the stock price”
        because “the market has already digested that information and in-
        corporated it into the price.” FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1310. Thus,
        “[c]orrective disclosures must present facts to the market that are
        new, that is, publicly revealed for the first time.” Meyer, 710 F.3d
        at 1197–98 (quoting Katyle v. Penn Nat’l Gaming, Inc., 637 F.3d 462,
        473 (4th Cir. 2011)).
               Moreover, where a purchaser of stock sells its shares “before
        the relevant truth begins to leak out, the misrepresentation will not
        have led to any loss.” Dura, 544 U.S. at 342. But once the truth is
        revealed, investors who purchased the stock at inflated prices—
        and, critically, those “who still hold their stock”—“will suffer eco-
        nomic loss, because they will no longer be able to recoup the infla-
        tionary component of their purchase price by reselling their stock
        in the newly calibrated marketplace.” FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1315
        (emphasis added). That is because “[w]hen the truth underlying
        the falsehood is finally revealed, . . . the market will digest the new
        information and cease attributing the artificial inflation to the
        price.” Id.
               With these principles in mind, we now turn to whether any
        of the alleged disclosures in the second amended complaint qualify
        as corrective disclosures at the pleading stage. We begin by
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        38                          Opinion of the Court                          22-10633

        analyzing the disclosures based on the following categories: (1) “al-
        legedly misleading corrective disclosures”; (2) “news articles and
        analyst reports”; and (3) “lawsuits and investigations.”9 We then
        look to the disclosures cumulatively and address Carpenters’s re-
        maining arguments.
                       1. “Allegedly Misleading Corrective Disclosures”
               In its order, the district court grouped several of the alleged
        disclosures based on Carpenters’s assertion that they “revealed the
        truth of the fraud” even though they “were accompanied by mis-
        statements and omissions that . . . misled investors about the true
        extent of the fraud.”
              Carpenters alleged that on October 13, 2015, MiMedx held
        an analyst day conference call where it “revealed that it had parted
        ways with a distributor (later determined to be CPM), which

        9 Carpenters  argues that the district court improperly employed a categorial
        approach because the grouping of the disclosures by source “completely
        stripped them of their context and timing.” We recognize that “a plaintiff need
        not rely on a single, complete corrective disclosure” and instead can show “the
        truth gradually leaked out into the marketplace ‘through a series of partial dis-
        closures.’” Meyer, 710 F.3d at 1197 (quoting Lormand, 565 F.3d at 261). But
        decisions from this Court, see id. at 1197–202, and other circuits, see, e.g., Katyle,
        637 F.3d at 473–77, have employed similar categorization in addressing
        whether disclosures qualify as corrective for purposes of demonstrating loss
        causation. We thus do not believe that the district court committed error in
        how it approached its analysis; there is no indication that the district court, in
        grouping the types of disclosures, “completely stripped them of their context
        and timing.” Nonetheless, our analysis concludes by explicitly considering all
        the alleged partial disclosures cumulatively.
USCA11 Case: 22-10633      Document: 58-1       Date Filed: 07/10/2023      Page: 39 of 55

        22-10633                Opinion of the Court                          39

        negatively impacted the Company’s 3Q15 results by $2 million to
        $3 million.” According to Carpenters, MiMedx’s stock price subse-
        quently dropped based on the market’s view that MiMedx lost a
        major distributor, but this drop “would have been worse if Defend-
        ants revealed the true scope of their fraud” and their use of the dis-
        tributor “to facilitate their improper sales and distribution prac-
        tices, including channel stuffing.” Additionally, on April 10, 2016,
        MiMedx issued a press release announcing its financial results for
        the first quarter of 2016, in which it recorded its first revenue miss
        after seventeen quarters of meeting or exceeding its revenue guid-
        ance. Carpenters alleged that this misleading press release led to a
        drop in MiMedx’s stock price, but the decline would have been
        worse had Defendants revealed the truth. Finally, on November
        20, 2017, MiMedx issued a press release announcing it had added
        materials to its website to address “Misinformation Disseminated
        Through Short Sellers,” even though, Carpenters claimed, Defend-
        ants were aware of the truth.
              As to these disclosures, the district court relied on In re Flag
        Telecom Holdings, Ltd. Securities Litigation, 574 F.3d 29 (2d Cir. 2009),
        and found that Carpenters was improperly trying to use these dis-
        closures “both ways,” i.e., by characterizing them as both mislead-
        ing and corrective.
               Carpenters argues that the district court overstated In re Flag
        Telecom’s holding. In that case, after the defendants disclosed that
        a portion of their revenue for the previous year was based on cer-
        tain transactions that could be used in a way to defraud investors,
USCA11 Case: 22-10633     Document: 58-1      Date Filed: 07/10/2023     Page: 40 of 55

        40                     Opinion of the Court                 22-10633

        the defendant company’s stock dropped forty-six percent. Id. at 31–
        32. The plaintiff-investors, including those who had sold their
        stock before the corrective disclosure, brought a securities class ac-
        tion against the defendants. Id. at 32, 37. The district court denied
        the defendants’ motion to dismiss, and the Second Circuit reversed.
        Id.
                The Second Circuit began by noting that those plaintiffs
        who had sold prior to the corrective disclosure “must prove that
        the loss they suffered was both foreseeable and caused by the ‘ma-
        terialization of the concealed risk.’” Id. at 40. The court then ad-
        dressed the plaintiffs’ argument that “the truth about demand and
        profitability began to leak into the market as early as [a year prior
        to the corrective disclosure] through ‘industry events,’” with spe-
        cific news concerning the defendants leaking into the market sev-
        eral months later and causing the share price to depress further. Id.
        at 41. The Second Circuit noted that these “industry events” were
        in the context of the defendants’ misleading statements them-
        selves, and not evidence of the defendants’ corrective disclosure.
        See id. The court stated that plaintiffs could not “have it both ways”
        by alleging the defendants made certain misstatements (i.e., the de-
        fendant company was doing well compared to other companies)
        while simultaneously alleging that the misstatements constituted
        corrective disclosures (i.e., that the other companies were not do-
        ing well). Id. To do so would “tend to transform a private securi-
        ties action into a partial downside insurance policy.” Id. (quoting
        Dura, 544 U.S. at 347–48).
USCA11 Case: 22-10633         Document: 58-1         Date Filed: 07/10/2023         Page: 41 of 55

        22-10633                   Opinion of the Court                                41

                Carpenters contends that In re Flag Telecom is distinguishable
        because it is a “unique case where plaintiffs effectively (and par-
        tially) pled themselves out of class certification.” Carpenters ar-
        gues that, by contrast, the disclosures in its pleading “revealed
        truthful information to the market, but also continued to conceal
        the fraud.” We disagree. After reviewing these three disclosures,
        MiMedx did not correct any “falsehood” in any of these alleged dis-
        closures. See FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1310 (“So long as the falsehood
        remains uncorrected, it will continue to taint the total mix of avail-
        able public information, and the market will continue to attribute
        the artificial inflation to the stock, day after day.”). Indeed, accept-
        ing these allegations as true, they show that Defendants provided
        misleading statements to conceal the alleged ongoing fraud by the
        company and, at the time, the market continued to digest this mis-
        information.
               Accordingly, we conclude that the district court did not err
        in concluding these alleged disclosures were not corrective and did
        not establish loss causation.10

        10 Carpenters also relies on the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Mineworkers’ Pension

        Scheme v. First Solar Inc., 881 F.3d 750, 754 (9th Cir. 2018), for the proposition
        that “[a] plaintiff may also prove loss causation by showing that the stock price
        fell upon the revelation of an earnings miss, even if the market was unaware
        at the time that fraud had concealed the miss.” We find Mineworkers’ Pension
        Scheme inapposite, given that Carpenters, unlike the plaintiffs in Mineworkers’
        Pension Scheme, sold its MiMedx stock before the truth about these disclosures
        was revealed. Under Dura, when the purchaser of stock sells its shares “before
        the relevant truth begins to leak out, the misrepresentation will not have led
        to any loss.” 544 U.S. at 342; see also FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1310.
USCA11 Case: 22-10633      Document: 58-1      Date Filed: 07/10/2023      Page: 42 of 55

        42                      Opinion of the Court                  22-10633

                         2. “News Articles and Analyst Reports”
              Turning to this second category of alleged disclosures, Car-
        penters alleges that the district court erred in its analysis because it
        “misunderstood the critical role that analysts and investigative
        journalists play in the securities markets, ignored the specific infor-
        mation those third parties imparted to MiMedx investors during
        the Class Period, and impermissibly drew factual inferences
        against” Carpenters. We disagree.
                As explained above, a “disclosure of confirmatory infor-
        mation—or information already known by the market—will not
        cause a change in the stock price”; “[c]orrective disclosures must
        present facts to the market that are new, that is, publicly revealed
        for the first time.” Meyer, 710 F.3d at 1197–98 (alteration in origi-
        nal) (first quoting FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1310; then quoting Katyle,
        637 F.3d at 473). We have held that when “the material portions”
        of articles or reports are “gleaned entirely from public filings and
        other publicly available information,” the use of that publicly avail-
        able information is “fatal” to a claim of loss causation. See id. at
        1198. Additionally, in Meyer, we rejected the argument that “‘ex-
        pert analysis of the source material’ that was previously unavailable
        to the market” constitutes a corrective disclosure, reasoning that
        “the mere repackaging of already-public information by an analyst
        or short-seller is simply insufficient to constitute a corrective dis-
        closure.” Id. at 1199. Indeed, “if the information relied upon in
        forming an opinion was previously known to the market, the only
        thing actually disclosed to the market when the opinion is
USCA11 Case: 22-10633     Document: 58-1      Date Filed: 07/10/2023    Page: 43 of 55

        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                       43

        released is the opinion itself, and such an opinion, standing alone,
        cannot ‘reveal[ ] to the market the falsity’” of the company’s prior
        misrepresentations. Id. (alteration and emphasis in original) (quot-
        ing FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1311 n.28). And, if the opposite were
        true, “then every investor who suffers a loss in the financial mar-
        kets could sue under § 10(b) using an analyst’s negative analysis of
        public filings as a corrective disclosure.” Id.
                Carpenters argues that numerous securities analysts’ reports
        uncovered new information for investors regarding MiMedx’s
        fraudulent business practices and “each fresh report expanded on
        prior ones, reflecting new information developed through the ana-
        lysts’ due diligence.” Reviewing the reports and articles alleged in
        the second amended complaint, we disagree and conclude that, un-
        der Meyer, they do not qualify as corrective disclosures. As the dis-
        trict court noted, each report and article only repeated information
        already in the public domain, demonstrated by the disclaimers
        made by the authors of those reports and articles stating that they
        were based on publicly available information. Cf. id. at 1198 (“The
        Einhorn Presentation contained a disclaimer on the second slide of
        the presentation stating that all of the information in the presenta-
        tion was ‘obtained from publicly available sources.’ Indeed, the
        material portions of the Einhorn Presentation were gleaned en-
        tirely from public filings and other publicly available infor-
        mation.”). Nor does Carpenters identify any new, non-public, or
        otherwise not readily available information contained in any of
        these reports or articles.
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        44                          Opinion of the Court                         22-10633

                 Further, while MiMedx’s stock price may have dropped in
        response to the release of each of these reports, we confronted the
        same circumstances in Meyer, where we concluded that the alleged
        disclosure of an analyst report was not corrective for purposes of
        loss causation. See id. at 1199–200. In doing so, we reasoned that
        “because the information used in the presentation had already been
        public for some time,” the decline of the stock price “was not due
        to the fact that the presentation was revelatory of any fraud, but
        was instead due to ‘changed investor expectations’ after an investor
        who wielded great clout in the industry voiced a negative opinion
        about the Company.” Id. at 1200. Similar reasoning holds true
        here. 11

        11 Carpenters  also argues that courts regularly hold that the market may learn
        of possible fraud from analysts and newspapers questioning a company’s fi-
        nancial results, relying on authority from other circuits. See, e.g., Pub. Emps.
        Ret. Sys. of Miss. v. Amedisys, Inc., 769 F.3d 313, 322 (5th Cir. 2014) (“While it is
        generally true that in an efficient market, any information released to the pub-
        lic is presumed to be immediately digested and incorporated into the price of
        a security, it is plausible that complex economic data understandable only
        through expert analysis may not be readily digestible by the marketplace.”);
        Mass. Ret. Sys. v. CVS Caremark Corp., 716 F.3d 229, 243 (1st Cir. 2013) (“To
        preclude a plaintiff from relying on analyst reports that expose the limitations
        of a defendant’s statements could permit the defendant to ‘defeat liability by
        refusing to admit the falsity of its prior misstatements.’” (quoting Alaska Elec.
        Pension Fund v. Flowserve Corp., 572 F.3d 221, 230 (5th Cir. 2009)). While other
        circuits may have different standards for considering whether analyst reports
        and news articles can qualify as corrective disclosures, we are bound to apply
        Meyer. See United States v. Vega-Castillo, 540 F.3d 1235, 1236 (11th Cir. 2008).
        And here Carpenters asks us to apply other circuits’ standards instead of our
        own without providing a principled basis to distinguish this case from Meyer.
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        22-10633               Opinion of the Court                         45

               Accordingly, because the analyst reports and news articles
        alleged by Carpenters in the second amended complaint did not
        disclose any new or non-public information, id. at 1198, the district
        court did not err in concluding that those reports and articles did
        not qualify as corrective disclosures.
                            3. “Lawsuits and Investigations”
                We now consider whether the announcements of lawsuits
        and investigations into Defendants’ fraudulent practices—(1) a
        whistleblower lawsuit by former employees of MiMedx, (2) a fed-
        eral government investigation, and (3) MiMedx’s own internal in-
        vestigation, i.e., the third audit committee investigation, coupled
        with the postponement of certain financial statements—qualify as
        corrective disclosures. The district court concluded that they were
        not, declining to hold that a lawsuit or investigation announcement
        could be considered retroactively as a corrective disclosure upon a
        later finding of fraud or wrongdoing.
               In Meyer, we held that “the commencement of an SEC inves-
        tigation, without more, is insufficient to constitute a corrective dis-
        closure for purposes of § 10(b)” because “[t]he announcement of an
        investigation reveals just that—an investigation—and nothing
        more.” 710 F.3d at 1201. We explained that while “stock prices
        may fall upon the announcement of an SEC investigation, . . . that
        is because the investigation can be seen to portend an added risk of
        future corrective action.” Id. (emphasis in original). But, we rea-
        soned, that added risk did “not mean that the investigations, in and
USCA11 Case: 22-10633      Document: 58-1      Date Filed: 07/10/2023     Page: 46 of 55

        46                     Opinion of the Court                  22-10633

        of themselves, reveal to the market that a company’s previous
        statements were false or fraudulent.” Id.
                In footnote 13 of Meyer, however, we hypothesized about
        the possibility that an SEC investigation could qualify as a basis for
        a corrective disclosure. Id. at 1201 n.13. We explained that Meyer’s
        holding was that “the disclosure of an SEC investigation, standing
        alone and without any subsequent disclosure of actual wrongdo-
        ing, does not ‘reveal[ ] to the market the pertinent truth’ of any-
        thing, and therefore does not qualify as a corrective disclosure.” Id.
        (alteration in original) (quoting FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1311). We
        noted that it was “impossible to say that an SEC investigation was
        the moment when the ‘relevant truth beg[an] to leak out’ if the
        truth never actually leaked out.” Id. (alteration in original) (quot-
        ing Dura, 544 U.S. at 342). But we explained that “[i]t may be pos-
        sible, in a different case, for the disclosure of an SEC investigation
        to qualify as a partial corrective disclosure for purposes of opening
        the class period when the investigation is coupled with a later finding
        of fraud or wrongdoing.” Id. (emphasis added).
               On appeal, Carpenters primarily focuses on MiMedx’s an-
        nouncement of the third auditing committee investigation, accom-
        panied by the postponement of certain financial statements. Car-
        penters argues that the announcement of that internal investiga-
        tion “becomes corrective in light of MiMedx’s subsequent an-
        nouncements of unreliable financial results, a forthcoming restate-
        ment, and forced resignations” and that “the market understood
        that something was wrong.”
USCA11 Case: 22-10633       Document: 58-1       Date Filed: 07/10/2023       Page: 47 of 55

        22-10633                 Opinion of the Court                           47

                But we need not decide the question posed by footnote 13
        of Meyer, i.e., whether it is possible for the announcement of an
        investigation “to qualify as a partial corrective disclosure for pur-
        poses of opening the class period when the investigation is coupled
        with a later finding of fraud or wrongdoing,” see id., because Car-
        penters sold all of its MiMedx stock on February 26, 2018, before
        the later finding of fraud or wrongdoing alleged in the second
        amended complaint. Dura and FindWhat are both instructive. In
        Dura, the Supreme Court stated that if a purchaser sells its stock
        shares “before the relevant truth begins to leak out, the misrepre-
        sentation will not have led to any loss.” 544 U.S. at 342. Subse-
        quently, in FindWhat, we applied Dura and held that “[w]hen the
        truth underlying the falsehood is finally revealed, . . . the market
        will digest the new information and cease attributing the artificial
        inflation to the price” and that, “[a]t that time, investors who pur-
        chased at inflated prices (and who still hold their stock) will suffer eco-
        nomic loss.” 658 F.3d at 1315 (emphasis added).
                Because Carpenters sold its MiMedx stock on February 26,
        2018—months before Defendants’ fraud and wrongdoing alleged
        in the second amended complaint was revealed—we conclude that
        Carpenters’s reliance on the hypothetical considered in footnote 13
        of Meyer is foreclosed by our decision in FindWhat, as Carpenters
        sold its stock before “the truth underlying [Defendants’] falsehood”
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        48                        Opinion of the Court                     22-10633

        was finally revealed.12 See FindWhat, 658 F.3d at 1315. Accordingly,
        we hold that the alleged disclosures in this category—the an-
        nouncements of an internal investigation, a government investiga-
        tion, and a whistleblower lawsuit—did not qualify as corrective dis-
        closures.
             4. The Alleged Disclosures Cumulatively and Carpenters’s Remain-
                                        ing Arguments
                Even considering cumulatively all of Carpenters’s alleged
        partial disclosures before it sold its shares of MiMedx stock, we con-
        clude that they do not qualify as a series of partial corrective disclo-
        sures to demonstrate loss causation under our precedent in
        FindWhat and Meyer. Most critically, Carpenters sold its MiMedx
        stock shares before the relevant truth “leak[ed] out,” Dura, 544 U.S.
        at 342, “reveal[ing] to the market the falsity” of MiMedx’s prior rep-
        resentations, Meyer, 710 F.3d at 1199 (quoting FindWhat, 658 F.3d
        at 1311 n.28).
              And none of Carpenters’s other remaining arguments
        change our conclusion. Carpenters characterizes our decision in
        Meyer as taking a more “restrictive view” of what types of disclo-
        sures qualify as corrective than the Supreme Court’s decision in
        Dura and relies on cases from other circuits throughout its briefing.
        But even if other circuits have different standards for considering
        what disclosures qualify as corrective for purposes of loss

        12For similar reasons, we are unpersuaded by Carpenters’s reliance on the
        Fifth Circuit’s decision in Amedisys, 769 F.3d at 324, and the Ninth Circuit’s
        decision in Lloyd v. CVB Financial Corp., 811 F.3d 1200 (9th Cir. 2016).
USCA11 Case: 22-10633           Document: 58-1        Date Filed: 07/10/2023     Page: 49 of 55

        22-10633                     Opinion of the Court                          49

        causation, we are bound to apply Meyer under the prior precedent
        rule. See United States v. Vega-Castillo, 540 F.3d 1235, 1236 (11th Cir.
        2008) (“Under the prior precedent rule, we are bound to follow a
        prior binding precedent ‘unless and until it is overruled by this
        court en banc or by the Supreme Court.’” (quoting United States v.
        Brown, 342 F.3d 1245, 1246 (11th Cir. 2003))). Carpenters also urges
        us to adopt a “a loss causation pleading standard that considers all
        partial disclosures cumulatively through the end of a class period,
        and apply that standard to all class members equally, regardless of
        when they sold stock.” However, Carpenters’s argument is fore-
        closed by the Supreme Court’s decision in Dura and our decisions
        in FindWhat and Meyer.
            We thus conclude that the district court did not err in dismiss-
        ing the second amended complaint for failing to sufficiently plead
        loss causation as to its securities fraud claims against Defendants. 13
                 C. Carpenters’s Post-judgment Motion and Request for
                                     Leave to Amend
              Finally, we turn to whether the district court erred in deny-
        ing Carpenters post-judgment motion under Rules 59(e) and 60(b)
        to vacate the judgment. Carpenters argues that the district court
        erred in not allowing it to file, under Rule 15(a)(2), 14 a third

        13 In
            light of this conclusion, we need not address Cherry Bekaert’s alternative
        arguments for affirmance.
        14   Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(a) provides, in relevant part:
                  (a) Amendments Before Trial.
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        50                       Opinion of the Court                      22-10633

        amended complaint, which sought to add as a plaintiff Amalga-
        mated Bank, an investor that Carpenters claims held MiMedx
        shares through the end of the Class Period. Carpenters further ar-
        gues that the district court improperly denied the motion without
        explanation, as the court only stated that Rule 15(a) did not apply
        after judgment was entered and because Carpenters was “not en-
        titled to relief under either Rule 59(e) or 60(b), [it was] also not en-
        titled to leave to amend.”
               We recognize that there is some tension in our circuit’s case
        law on the proper standard for a court to evaluate a post-judgment
        motion for leave to amend, i.e., whether the standards of Rule 15(a)
        or the standards of Rules 59(e) and 60(b) apply. Compare Jacobs v.
        Tempur-Pedic Int’l, Inc., 626 F.3d 1327, 1344 (11th Cir. 2010) (“[Rule]
        15(a) has no application once the district court has dismissed the
        complaint and entered final judgment for the defendant. Post-
        judgment, the plaintiff may seek leave to amend if he is granted

                (1) Amending as a Matter of Course. A party may amend its
                pleading once as a matter of course within:
                  (A) 21 days after serving it, or
                  (B) if the pleading is one to which a responsive pleading is
                  required, 21 days after service of a responsive pleading or
                  21 days after service of a motion under Rule 12(b), (e), or
                  (f), whichever is earlier.
                (2) Other Amendments. In all other cases, a party may
                amend its pleading only with the opposing party's written
                consent or the court's leave. The court should freely give
                leave when justice so requires.
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        22-10633                Opinion of the Court                         51

        relief under Rule 59(e) or Rule 60(b)(6).” (alteration in original) (ci-
        tations omitted) (quoting United States ex rel. Atkins v. McInteer, 470
        F.3d 1350, 1361 n.22 (11th Cir. 2006))), with Spanish Broad. Sys. of
        Fla., Inc. v. Clear Channel Commc’ns, Inc., 376 F.3d 1065, 1077 (11th
        Cir. 2004) (stating that under Rule 15(a)’s standard that a court
        “should freely give leave [to amend] when justice so requires” and
        that the Supreme Court’s decision in Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178
        (1962), applies to a plaintiff’s motion to amend its complaint after
        the judgment). When faced with an intra-circuit split, we must ap-
        ply the “earliest case” rule, which states that “when circuit author-
        ity is in conflict, a panel should look to the line of authority con-
        taining the earliest case, because a decision of a prior panel cannot
        be overturned by a later panel.” Morrison v. Amway Corp., 323 F.3d
        920, 929 (11th Cir. 2003).
               Applying the earliest case rule, the earliest decision from our
        Circuit on this issue is Czeremcha v. International Ass’n of Machinists
        & Aerospace Workers, AFL-CIO, 724 F.2d 1552 (11th Cir. 1984). In
        Czeremcha, the plaintiff argued that he had a right to amend his
        complaint as a matter of course under Rule 15(a) after the com-
        plaint was dismissed. Id. at 1555. We explained that we had not
        “expressly decided the issue” of whether the right to amend under
        Rule 15(a) “dissolv[es] upon the granting of the motion to dismiss.”
        Id. We also noted the criticism that decisions “holding that the
        plaintiff has an absolute right under Rule 15(a) to amend after dis-
        missal of the complaint as frustrating ‘the desire for certainty in the
        termination of litigation.’” Id. at 1556 (quoting Moore’s Federal
        Practice ¶ 15.07[2]). “In light of this criticism and the confusion in
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        52                    Opinion of the Court                22-10633

        this circuit’s case law on the issue,” we concluded that we were
        adopting “the rule that after a complaint is dismissed the right to
        amend under Rule 15(a) terminates.” Id. But we also held that a
        plaintiff “may still move the court for leave to amend, and such
        amendments should be granted liberally,” although “[s]uch a mo-
        tion would be inappropriate . . . if the court has clearly indicated
        either that no amendment is possible or that dismissal of the com-
        plaint also constitutes dismissal of the action.” Id. at 1556 & n.6
        (footnote omitted). We further held that the plaintiff could move
        for relief under Rules 59(e) or 60(b) “on the basis of proposed
        amendments even after the action is dismissed and final judgment
        is entered.” Id. at 1556. In doing so, we explained that “Rule 59(e)
        or 60(b) would apply only once the action is dismissed” because “a
        dismissal of the complaint is not tantamount to a dismissal of the
        action unless the court so specifies.” Id. at 1556 n.9.
               We conclude that Czeremcha and its reasoning applies
        equally to post-judgment motions to amend where the plaintiff has
        not exercised its right under Rule 15(a)(1) to amend as a matter of
        course and, as here, to post-judgment motions where the plaintiff
        has already amended its complaint and the district court has discre-
        tion in granting leave to amend. Applying Czeremcha, the record
        here reflects that, on the same date the district court entered its
        order dismissing the second amended complaint, it entered final
        judgment stating that the “action” was “dismissed.” Accordingly,
        we review the district court’s denial of Carpenters’s post-judgment
        request for leave to amend under the standards governing Rules
        59(e) and 60(b).
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        22-10633                Opinion of the Court                         53

                Rule 59(e) provides that “[a] motion to alter or amend a
        judgment must be filed no later than 28 days after the entry of the
        judgment.” “The only grounds for granting [a Rule 59] motion are
        newly-discovered evidence or manifest errors of law or fact.” Ar-
        thur v. King, 500 F.3d 1335, 1343 (11th Cir. 2007) (quoting In re Kel-
        logg, 197 F.3d 1116, 1119 (11th Cir. 1999)). But a “Rule 59(e) motion
        [cannot be used] to relitigate old matters, raise argument or present
        evidence that could have been raised prior to the entry of judg-
        ment.” Id. (alteration in original) (quoting Michael Linet, Inc. v. Vil-
        lage of Wellington, 408 F.3d 757, 763 (11th Cir. 2005)). Additionally,
        under Rule 60(b)(1), a party may seek relief from a final judgment
        based on mistakes in the application of law. See Parks v. U.S. Life &
        Credit Corp., 677 F.2d 838, 839–40 (11th Cir. 1982). And Rule
        60(b)(6) provides that a “court may relieve a party . . . from a final
        judgment . . . for any other reason that justifies relief.” Relief from
        judgment under Rule 60(b)(6), however, is an extraordinary rem-
        edy and requires a showing of “extraordinary circumstances” to
        justify the reopening of a final judgment. Arthur, 739 F.3d at 628
        (quoting Gonzalez v. Crosby, 545 U.S. 524, 535 (2005)). Rules
        60(b)(1) and (6) “are mutually exclusive,” and “a court cannot grant
        relief under (b)(6) for any reason which the court could consider
        under (b)(1).” Cavaliere v. Allstate Ins. Co., 996 F.2d 1111, 1115 (11th
        Cir. 1993) (quoting Solaroll Shade & Shutter Corp. v. Bio-Energy Sys.,
        Inc., 803 F.2d 1130, 1133 (11th Cir. 1986)). We review a district
        court’s decision to grant or deny relief under Rule 59(e) or under
        Rule 60(b) for abuse of discretion. Shuford, 508 F.3d at 1341; Arthur,
        739 F.3d at 628.
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        54                     Opinion of the Court                  22-10633

                As to Rule 59(e), we also conclude that the district court did
        not abuse its discretion in determining that Carpenters sought to
        relitigate arguments it had already raised before entry of judgment.
        See Michael Linet, 408 F.3d at 763. As to Rule 60(b)(1), for the rea-
        sons stated above, we find no mistake in the district court’s appli-
        cation of the law in this case that would change the outcome of this
        case. And, as to Rule 60(b)(6), the district court found that Carpen-
        ters’s motion primarily focused on the court’s purported “mistakes
        in the application of the law,” which fall squarely under Rule
        60(b)(1). Indeed, Carpenters did not argue that there were any “ex-
        traordinary circumstances” justifying the reopening of the final
        judgment in this case. See Arthur, 739 F.3d at 628. We therefore
        conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion in deny-
        ing relief under Rule 60(b)(1) and (6). And because the district court
        did not abuse its discretion in denying Carpenters relief under
        Rules 59(e) and 60(b), we conclude that the district court did not
        abuse its discretion in denying Carpenters’s post-judgment request
        for leave to amend its complaint a third time.
                               IV.    CONCLUSION
                For the reasons discussed above, we conclude that the dis-
        trict court erred in finding that Carpenters lacked standing to bring
        its Exchange Act claims against Defendants and vacate that portion
        of the district court’s order. But we affirm the district court’s order
        dismissing Carpenters’s second amended complaint for failure to
        plead loss causation. We also affirm the district court’s order deny-
        ing Carpenters’s post-judgment motion, including the denial of
        Carpenters’s request for leave to amend.
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        22-10633           Opinion of the Court                    55

              VACATED IN PART, AFFIRMED IN PART.