Bloomberg ? A federal judge dismissed claims against the chairman and chief financial officer of Loral Space & Communications Ltd., the No. 3 US satellite maker, in a lawsuit over the company's investment in Globalstar LP.

US District Judge John G. Koeltl in New York ruled that shareholders suing Loral Chairman Bernard L. Schwartz and Chief Financial Officer Richard L. Townsend failed to show sufficient "motive and opportunity to commit fraud," according to a 44-page opinion dated February 23 and filed Friday.

The suit, which unified a series of claims alleging securities violations by New York-based Loral related to Globalstar, a satellite-telephone company in which Loral had invested, said the defendants had misrepresented Globalstar's financial condition.

"The plaintiffs' allegations that the defendants violated various accounting practices by incorrectly calculating Globalstar's losses and by failing to recognise impairment losses in Loral's public SEC filings do not give rise to the necessary inference of fraud," Koeltl wrote.

New York-based Loral filed for bankruptcy protection in July, after amassing more than $3 billion in debt and failing to make a profit since 1997. Last month, Bermuda-based Intelsat Ltd. won clearance from the Federal Communications Commission to buy six satellites from Loral for $1.1 billion.

Jeanette H. Clonan, a Loral spokeswoman, declined to comment, saying she had not seen the ruling. Shareholder lawyer Aaron Lee Brody did not return a call seeking comment.