An intellectual property attorney's fight with his former firm has Texas Supreme Court justices wondering about the right of managers to assign a zero value to a departing partner's shares.

During oral argument Thursday, Justice Evan Young conjectured that if a shareholder had worked in a firm through a calendar year and was then told his cash-out shares for that period was zero, "that seems problematic, but I don't see where in your argument they couldn't do it. I might have trouble recruiting new partners if they did that."