Saidnia v. Nimbus Mining LLC, 1:21-cv-07792

Plaintiff Tiffany Saidnia sued Nimbus Mining LLC, Remy Jacobson, Greg Bachrach, and Jean-Marc Jacobson, alleging breach of contract involving Bitcoin payments.
Defendants previously moved to dismiss the amended complaint; that motion was denied on October 24, 2023, with a deadline set for Defendants to answer.
Defendants’ prior counsel moved to withdraw shortly before the answer deadline, resulting in Defendants missing the deadline to respond.
Plaintiff obtained a Clerk’s Certificate of Default after Defendants failed to timely answer.
Defendants, with new counsel, moved to vacate the default; Plaintiff cross-moved for default judgment.
The central legal question was whether Defendants had shown “good cause” to vacate the default under Rule 55(c).

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Willfulness of Default	Defendants’ default was a strategic, intentional act	Defendants failed to answer due to assumption about process, not willful	Default not willful
Prejudice to Plaintiff if Default Vacated	Delay harms Plaintiff due to Bitcoin’s fluctuating value	No real prejudice; damages calculation unaffected by market timing	No sufficient prejudice
Existence of Meritorious Defense	Defendants lacked a substantive defense, particularly to the Bitcoin claim	Multiple affirmative defenses are available; disputes key allegations	Meritorious defenses shown
Standard for Vacating Default Entry	Should not be vacated; default judgment warranted	Strong Second Circuit preference for resolving cases on merit	Strong preference for merits

Enron Oil Corp. v. Diakuhara, 10 F.3d 90 (2d Cir. 1993) (explaining the standard for vacating default and the Second Circuit’s preference for resolutions on the merits)
Cody v. Mello, 59 F.3d 13 (2d Cir. 1995) (reaffirming the strong judicial preference to decide cases on their merits rather than by default)
New York v. Green, 420 F.3d 99 (2d Cir. 2005) (all doubts on a Rule 55(c) motion must be resolved in favor of the defaulting party)