The lawsuit alleges that defendants made materially false and misleading statements about Covetrus’ business and operations as part of, and following, the company’s formation in February 2019 through a spin-off of Henry Schein’s Animal Health Business. Among other things, the lawsuit alleges that, in Covetrus’ offering documents to investors, defendants touted Covetrus’ strengths as a technology-enabled animal health business with a comprehensive service and technology platform and supply chain infrastructure. These benefits were reiterated later in Covetrus’ financial reports, in which defendants reassured that the integration was “on track” to hit financial targets. However, in reality, Covetrus’ strengths were significantly overstated and the costs of the integration as well as the separation of Covetrus from Henry Schein had been much higher than represented. On August 13, 2019, Covetrus shocked its investors by reporting a net loss of $0.09 per share rather than the expected increase of $0.17 per share and slashed its EBITDA guidance from estimates of $250 million to a realized $200 million. In its explanation, Covetrus confessed the undisclosed difficulties it was having in platform integration and separations costs from Henry Schein. Following this disclosure, Covetrus’ stock price plummeted $9.30, or 40%, per share in a single trading day, to close at $13.89 per share on August 13, 2019.