On May 2, 2016, the First Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated a $5.9B suit brought by the Federal Home Loan Bank of Boston (“FHLBB”), alleging that Moody’s Corp and Moody’s Investor’s Service, Inc. (together, “Moody’s”) knowingly provided false ratings on certain Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities purchased by FHLBB. The case had been dismissed for lack of personal jurisdiction by Judge George A. O’Toole Jr. of the District of Massachusetts, who also held that the court could not transfer the case to another federal court where jurisdiction would be proper because 28 U.S.C. §1631 only permitted the transfer of cases dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, rather than personal jurisdiction.

The First Circuit vacated that decision, concluding that the plain language of 28 U.S.C. §1631, the statute’s legislative history, and case law from other Circuits all weighed in favor of a ruling that the statute also permits transfer where the claims at issue were dismissed on either personal or subject matter jurisdiction grounds. Accordingly, the First Circuit remanded the case to the district court to determine whether transfer was “in the interests of justice,” in accord with the statutory requirement for transfer under 28 U.S.C. §1631.  Decision.