Over the past year, a flurry of class action lawsuits alleging misuse of retirement plan forfeitures have been filed against major U.S. retirement plans and their fiduciaries.  Starting in September 2023, a plaintiff’s law firm filed a putative class action lawsuit against Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc., in the Southern District of California, which alleged that Thermo Fisher retirement plan fiduciaries breached their duties, violated ERISA’s anti-inurement provision and engaged in prohibited transactions by using plan forfeitures to offset employer matching contribution obligations instead of paying down plan administrative costs otherwise payable by plan participants.  Although using forfeitures to offset employer contributions has been expressly allowed under U.S. Treasury rules for decades, the plaintiffs in Thermo Fisher asserted the novel theory that doing so violated ERISA’s fiduciary duties of loyalty and prudence.  Since that time, approximately 15 similar lawsuits have been filed by several plaintiffs’ law firms across the country against