Indiana’s Court of Appeals shut down Cantor Fitzgerald’s complaint against a cluster of insurers that backed a $25mn fidelity bond for Tower Bridge, its financial services arm, after a major fraud wiped out more than $30mn.
The dismissal came on jurisdictional grounds, not the substance of the claim, which leaves Cantor stuck without a forum in Indiana for now.
Maybe they expected the carriers’ licensing footprint to be enough. According to our analysts, that’s always a shaky bet.
The bond came from four insurers: Federal Insurance Co., U.S. Specialty Insurance Co., Liberty Mutual Insurance Co., and National Fire Insurance Co. of Pittsburgh, PA.
Federal underwrote $10mn and stood as the lone Indiana-organized company. The other three took on $5mn each.
All four, though, were licensed by the Indiana Department of Insurance and had appointed in-state agents to accept legal documents. Cantor leaned hard on that detail as part of its venue argument.
The fraud surfaced in 2020 when a Tower Bridge employee and an outside accomplice diverted more than $30mn from Cantor. After the insurers refused full payment in May 2024, Cantor filed in Indiana for breach of contract, bad faith, unjust enrichment, and promissory estoppel.
They argued Federal’s Indiana citizenship, plus the licensing and appointment requirements, anchored the entire cluster of insurers to the state.
The nonresident carriers pushed back, saying their only tie was the routine licensing that lets them do business in Indiana. Nothing more.
Indiana law extends jurisdiction for contracts formed in the state or with state residents, but the fidelity bond was drafted in New York and none of the companies aside from Federal reside in Indiana.
The insurers called the licensing link “the unremarkable fact” many carriers share, and the trial court essentially agreed.
Cantor argued the insurers “banded together” with Federal, creating ongoing obligations to a resident company and establishing the minimum contacts required under federal due process.
The trial court didn’t buy it and dismissed the complaint. It said state insurance registration rules don’t create jurisdiction, and Cantor hadn’t shown any other meaningful connection tying the nonresident carriers to Indiana.
The appeals court affirmed. Filing an agent’s name with the Department of Insurance or complying with licensing laws doesn’t equal consent to personal jurisdiction.
Cantor’s theory that the bond functioned as a unified contract didn’t stick either. The court pointed out the bond package was one document built on separate, individual contracts.
Each insurer’s liability stayed limited to its own share, and if the bond ended, each one alone was responsible for refunding its part of the premium. That structure undercut the idea of a collective commercial presence in Indiana.
The panel also said Cantor failed the minimum contacts test. The claim didn’t arise from anything that happened in Indiana. Cantor isn’t a resident. Tower Bridge isn’t a resident.
The bond wasn’t issued in Indiana. The theft happened in the United Kingdom, where Tower Bridge operates. Nothing tied the dispute to the state except Federal’s incorporation. And that wasn’t enough.
We think the ruling underscores a trend: courts get increasingly wary of stretching personal jurisdiction based on licensing or administrative filings. Maybe Cantor expected a friendlier reading, but the appeals court kept the line tight.
