On December 9, 2025, the First Department issued a decision in AmTrust N. Am., Inc. v. Insurance Specialty Group LLC, 2025 NY Slip Op. 06801, holding that equitable estoppel extended the limitations period for claims based on a breach of fiduciary duty except for claims based on a failure to disclose, explaining:
Because plaintiff was relying on defendant’s expertise and experience to administer the APP, the MPA required defendant to perform its obligations as a fiduciary of plaintiff and use its best efforts to perform all acts necessary for the proper conduct of business on plaintiff’s behalf. It further provided that a breach of defendant’s fiduciary duties would constitute a material breach of the agreement.
As alleged, defendant breached its contractual obligations and duties over the course of the APP by failing to properly perform its underwriting duties, carelessly administering the APP, improperly servicing policies, and entering into policies on behalf of plaintiff based upon improper conflicts of interest. Plaintiff asserts that notwithstanding its fiduciary duty to disclose under the MPA, defendant repeatedly hid these known issues and conflicts from plaintiff. It was only in 2022, after massive losses began to mount, that plaintiff discovered defendant’s purported mismanagement.
To the extent that Count One of the complaint is premised on contractual breaches by defendant, we hold that the doctrine of equitable estoppel is applicable. Plaintiff has sufficiently alleged, at this juncture, that defendant breached the MPA through its alleged failure to perform its underwriting duties, its careless administration of the APP, its improper servicing of policies, and its potential conflicts of interest. Plaintiff separately alleged that under the MPA, defendant was required, yet failed, to disclose to plaintiff known risks of the APP, defendant’s relationship with its warranty provider, and the likelihood that its losses relative to the premiums plaintiff received would far exceed what was expected. Accepting these allegations as true and according the complaint all favorable inferences, plaintiff has sufficiently alleged at this juncture that defendant forestalled plaintiff’s ability to meaningfully uncover its deficient administration of the APP, and therefore, at this stage, defendant is equitably estopped from asserting a statute of limitations defense.
Plaintiff has also sufficiently shown, at this stage, that defendant’s purported concealment of facts in breach of its fiduciary duty to disclose constituted separate and distinct contractual breaches that were not coterminous with the other enumerated breaches of the MPA forming the basis of plaintiff’s breach of contract cause of action. Accordingly, contrary to defendant’s position, the specific acts of concealment underlying plaintiff’s estoppel claim are not the same acts at the heart of the vast majority of contractual breaches underlying plaintiff’s substantive cause of action.
Nevertheless, as plaintiff concedes, equitable estoppel is not applicable to that portion of plaintiff’s breach of contract claim premised on defendant’s alleged breaches of its fiduciary duty to disclose. Nor does the continuing wrong doctrine revive these claims insofar as they are time-barred. Although it is true that the continuing wrong doctrine tolls the running of the statute of limitations where there is a series of independent, distinct wrongs, it saves claims for recovery of damages only to the extent of wrongs committed within the applicable statute of limitations. Thus, even under this doctrine, plaintiff may only avail itself of claims arising within six years of the commencement of this action (taking into account any applicable COVID-19 tolling).
(Internal quotations and citations omitted).