Preliminary injunction motion denied for large financial institution

Herb D. Vest (aka H.D. Vest) is an entrepreneur who built a successful financial services company under the name H.D. Vest Financial Services and then sold it to Wells Fargo & Company. Wells Fargo continued to operate the business under the name H.D. Vest, Inc. After selling the company to Wells Fargo, Mr. Vest founded several other unrelated businesses in the advertising and online dating fields using used H.D. Vest as part of the business names for these companies. Wells Fargo sued and sought a preliminary injunction seeking to enjoin all use of the H.D. Vest name by Mr. Vest for any business and to stop Mr. Vest from referencing H.D. Vest on his personal website for any purpose. We submitted an opposition brief arguing that Mr. Vest was not precluded by contract from using the H.D. Vest name, Mr. Vest's references to his past relationship with the H.D. Vest financial services company constituted fair use, Mr. Vest had not used the H.D. Vest name in commerce, and there was no likelihood of confusion or dilution. The court denied Wells Fargo’s preliminary injunction motion.