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Articles 1 - 30 of 249
Full-Text Articles in Law
Loophole Entrepreneurship, Brian M. Sirman
Loophole Entrepreneurship, Brian M. Sirman
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
All entrepreneurs seek favorable legal or regulatory treatment for their businesses. Sometimes this leads an entrepreneur to build a business within a gap in the law—a loophole. In so doing, these “loophole entrepreneurs” may avoid steep regulatory compliance costs that otherwise would beset (or perhaps prohibit) their businesses, thereby gaining advantages over competitors. Despite these benefits, loophole entrepreneurship is fraught with risks. Loopholes, by nature, are fragile, and their contours are often uncertain. Moreover, the stigma of “exploiting a loophole” (which connotes unfairness or deception) can provoke ill will among competitors, policymakers, and the public.
The ranks of loophole entrepreneurs …
Outsourcing Voting To Ai: Can Chatgpt Advise Index Funds On Proxy Voting Decisions?, Chen Wang
Outsourcing Voting To Ai: Can Chatgpt Advise Index Funds On Proxy Voting Decisions?, Chen Wang
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Released in November 2022, Chat Generative Pre-training Transformer (“ChatGPT”), has risen rapidly to prominence, and its versatile capabilities have already been shown in a variety of fields. Due to ChatGPT’s advanced features, such as extensive pre-training on diverse data, strong generalization ability, fine-tuning capabilities, and improved reasoning, the use of AI in the legal industry could experience a significant transformation. Since small passive funds with low-cost business models generally lack the financial resources to make informed proxy voting decisions that align with their shareholders’ interests, this Article considers the use of ChatGPT to assist small investment funds, particularly small passive …
The Public’S Companies, Andrew K. Jennings
The Public’S Companies, Andrew K. Jennings
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
This Essay uses a series of survey studies to consider how public understandings of public and private companies map into urgent debates over the role of the corporation in American society. Does a social-media company, for example, owe it to its users to follow the free-speech principles embodied in the First Amendment? May corporate managers pursue environmental, social, and governance (“ESG”) policies that could reduce short-term or long-term profits? How should companies respond to political pushback against their approaches to free expression or ESG?
The studies’ results are consistent with understandings that both public and private companies have greater public …
Expanding Mfw: Delaware Law Should Offer A Business Judgment Rule Safe Harbor For All Conflicted Controller Transactions, Alex Lindsey
Expanding Mfw: Delaware Law Should Offer A Business Judgment Rule Safe Harbor For All Conflicted Controller Transactions, Alex Lindsey
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
While courts usually defer to a board’s business decisions under the business judgment rule, courts will apply a much less deferential standard of review due to loyalty concerns if a conflicted controller is involved in a business decision such as a merger. However, in Kahn v. M & F Worldwide (“MFW”) when a squeeze out merger was challenged by a minority stockholder, the Delaware Supreme Court reviewed the transaction under the deferential business judgment rule standard because the Court found that the structure of the transaction neutralized the controller loyalty concerns. Building on this reasoning, the Court developed a checklist …
The Problem With The “Non-Class” Class: An Urgent Call For Improved Gatekeepers In Merger Objection Litigation, Josh Molder
The Problem With The “Non-Class” Class: An Urgent Call For Improved Gatekeepers In Merger Objection Litigation, Josh Molder
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Until recently, class actions dominated merger objection litigation. However, plaintiff’s lawyers have constructed a “non-class” class where an individual suit can benefit from the leverage of a certified class without ever meeting the stringent class certification requirements of Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 23. This new development has initiated a shift in merger objection litigation where plaintiffs are increasingly filing individual suits instead of class actions. However, this shift has left shareholders vulnerable to collusive settlements because plaintiff’s attorneys have significant control over these suits and a strong incentive to settle quickly for a substantial fee. Additionally, corporate defendants are …
Gamestopped: How Robinhood’S Gamestop Trading Halt Reveals The Complexities Of Retail Investor Protection, Neal F. Newman
Gamestopped: How Robinhood’S Gamestop Trading Halt Reveals The Complexities Of Retail Investor Protection, Neal F. Newman
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Should brokers have the unfettered right to restrict investor trading? GameStop, a brick-and-mortar video game retailer, had been experiencing declining revenues since 2016. However, GameStop saw its share price climb almost 1000 percent in the span of a one- week period from January 21, 2021 to January 27, 2021 due to retail investors buying significant amounts of GameStop shares during that period. Melvin Capital, a hedge fund, ended up losing billions as they were betting that GameStop shares would lose value instead of increase—a practice referred to as short selling. On January 28, 2021, brokers inexplicably halted trading on GameStop …
The Exit Theory Of Judicial Appraisal, William J. Carney, Keith Sharfman
The Exit Theory Of Judicial Appraisal, William J. Carney, Keith Sharfman
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
For many years, we and other commentators have observed the problem with allowing judges wide discretion to fashion appraisal awards to dissenting shareholders based on widely divergent, expert valuation evidence submitted by the litigating parties. The results of this discretionary approach to valuation have been to make appraisal litigation less predictable and therefore more costly and likely. While this has been beneficial to professionals who profit from corporate valuation litigation, it has been harmful to shareholders, making deals costlier and less likely to be completed.
In this Article, we propose to end the problem of discretionary judicial valuation by tracing …
Money Creation And Bank Clearing, Nadav Orian Peer
Money Creation And Bank Clearing, Nadav Orian Peer
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Like many other countries, the U.S. money supply consists primarily of deposits created by private commercial banks. How we understand bank money creation matters enormously. We are currently witnessing a debate between two competing understandings. On the one hand, a long-standing conventional view argues that bank money creation originates in individual market transactions. Based on this understanding, the conventional view narrowly limits the scope of banking regulation to market failure correction. On the other hand, authors in a new legal literature emphasize the public aspects of bank money creation, characterizing it as a “public franchise,” a “public-private partnership,” and part …
The Battle With Big Tech: Analyzing Antitrust Enforcement And Proposed Reforms, Youngjae Lee, Morgan Hagenbuch
The Battle With Big Tech: Analyzing Antitrust Enforcement And Proposed Reforms, Youngjae Lee, Morgan Hagenbuch
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
No abstract provided.
The Solution To Shadow Trading Is Not Found In Current Insider Trading Law: A Proposed Amendment To Rule 10b5-2, Jamel Gross-Cassel
The Solution To Shadow Trading Is Not Found In Current Insider Trading Law: A Proposed Amendment To Rule 10b5-2, Jamel Gross-Cassel
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Shadow trading is a lucrative way to exploit a loophole in insider trading law. Insiders abuse this loophole to make six-figure profits and escape liability when done at the right companies. Those who shadow trade use material, nonpublic information to trade not in the securities of their own company, which would be illegal, but in the securities of a closely related company where the information is just as impactful. Efforts to close this loophole rely on the individual insider trading policies of the involved companies. These policies vary in language, making liability for shadow trading dependent on specific language or …
Direct Liability And Veil-Piercing: When One Door Closes, Another Opens, King Fung Tsang, Katie Ng
Direct Liability And Veil-Piercing: When One Door Closes, Another Opens, King Fung Tsang, Katie Ng
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Piercing the corporate veil has been substantially limited in English law since Prest v. Petrodel. This contraction coincides with the development of the direct liability doctrine which attaches liability directly on the parent company. The authors argue that the shift from using piercing the corporate veil to direct liability is a positive development as it gives English courts a better tool to combat the abuse of separate legal personality. However, compared the English doctrines with their counterparts under the U.S. laws, it is argued that the much broader U.S. piercing doctrine makes the expansion of direct liability doctrine unnecessary in …
Output Effect Of Private Antitrust Enforcement, Sinchit Lai
Output Effect Of Private Antitrust Enforcement, Sinchit Lai
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
A growing body of literature evaluates the impact of antitrust laws on economic growth. Most of these empirical studies identify a positive impact; however, the existing literature only studies the effect of the existence of antitrust laws, but not their enforcement. To fill this gap in the literature, this Article uses private antitrust case filing numbers to examine the growth effect. Employing U.S. data and, after addressing endogeneity, using a two-stage least squares (2SLS) regression analysis, I identify a negative and robust association between private enforcement and output on a national level in the short run over the period from …
Does Cryptocurrency Staking Fall Under Sec Jurisdiction?, Nicholas E. Gonzalez
Does Cryptocurrency Staking Fall Under Sec Jurisdiction?, Nicholas E. Gonzalez
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Bitcoin, the first blockchain and cryptocurrency (crypto), launched in 2009 when the Bitcoin network opened to the public. A blockchain is a digital ledger technology where transactions are aggregated and permanently recorded into blocks of information. Maintenance of a blockchain is typically conducted by decentralized managers who own and operate network computers (“Nodes”) and serve the functions normally handled by central intermediaries to validate and confirm transactions. All Nodes follow a blockchain protocol. In Bitcoin’s and most cryptos’ cases, this protocol is known as a Proof- of-Work protocol which requires a large amount of energy consumption. Consequently, Proof-of-Stake protocols (“PoS”) …
Goodbye Buybacks? Why Recent Stock Buyback Reform Proposals Go Beyond What Is Necessary, Joshua Zelen
Goodbye Buybacks? Why Recent Stock Buyback Reform Proposals Go Beyond What Is Necessary, Joshua Zelen
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
This note provides an overview of the intensifying debate around the impact that stock buybacks have on economic inequality and the proposals designed to reform the practice. With the advent of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) 1982 promulgation of Rule 10b-18, corporations began allocating vast portions of their profits to stock buybacks. In recent years, this practice has become increasingly more common and has surpassed previous historical benchmarks.
Critics of stock buybacks primarily view the practice as a misuse of excess corporate funds that could instead be allocated to improve employee working conditions, benefits, and future outcomes. Opponent’s concerns …
The Twenty-First Annual A.A. Sommer, Jr. Lecture On Corporate, Securities & Financial Law At The Fordham Corporate Law Center, Matthew Diller, G. Jeffrey Boujoukos, Ben A. Indek, Allison Herren Lee
The Twenty-First Annual A.A. Sommer, Jr. Lecture On Corporate, Securities & Financial Law At The Fordham Corporate Law Center, Matthew Diller, G. Jeffrey Boujoukos, Ben A. Indek, Allison Herren Lee
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
No abstract provided.
Here To Stay: Wrestling With The Future Of The Quickly Maturing Spac Market, Matthew Diller, Rick Fleming, Stephen Fraidin, Aj Harris, Gregory F. Laufer, Mark Lebovitch, Gregg A. Noel, Hester M. Peirce, Usha R. Rodrigues, Mike Stegemoller, Verity Winship, Douglas Ellenoff
Here To Stay: Wrestling With The Future Of The Quickly Maturing Spac Market, Matthew Diller, Rick Fleming, Stephen Fraidin, Aj Harris, Gregory F. Laufer, Mark Lebovitch, Gregg A. Noel, Hester M. Peirce, Usha R. Rodrigues, Mike Stegemoller, Verity Winship, Douglas Ellenoff
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
No abstract provided.
Non-Profit Organizations Should Prioritize Governance In Board Selection Decisions—Those That Prioritize Money May Pay Too Much, Heidi Grunwald, Daniel Isaacs
Non-Profit Organizations Should Prioritize Governance In Board Selection Decisions—Those That Prioritize Money May Pay Too Much, Heidi Grunwald, Daniel Isaacs
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Non-profit corporations must comply with federal tax laws, and their governing bodies must satisfy corporation law-based duties, but they are not subject to the regulatory requirements of publicly traded corporations. This discrepancy should be troubling, because the stakeholders of non-profit organizations are far more vulnerable than the typical investor. Accordingly, non-profit boards have a particularly strong need for good governance. However, our research shows that non-profit board members believe that board selection procedures prioritize giving over the ability to attract and retain members with attributes commonly associated with good governance. To address this problem, we argue that laws should require …
Spac The Deck: Why The Control Exerted By Spac Sponsors Subjects De-Spac Transactions To Entire Fairness Review, Aj Harris
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs), otherwise known as blank check companies, are corporations created to raise capital from investors with the express purpose of using such capital to acquire an already existing business. Much like a traditional merger, the transaction between the SPAC and the target company (formally called the “Initial Business Combination” or colloquially the “de- SPAC transaction”) is highly scrutinized in shareholder litigation. However, Delaware courts have not definitively established under which standard these de-SPAC transactions should be reviewed. This Note examines the SPAC structure, evaluates the arguments for the respective standards, and ultimately concludes that Delaware courts …
Riding The Wave: Fairness For Foreign Investors In India’S Impending Insolvency Tsunami, Nicole Mecca
Riding The Wave: Fairness For Foreign Investors In India’S Impending Insolvency Tsunami, Nicole Mecca
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Reminiscent of the warning signs of a tsunami, bankruptcy and insolvency courts across the globe have been eerily calm despite unprecedented conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic. The full extent of the pandemic’s effect, including a tidal wave of wide-spread corporate and financial sector harm and wide-spread economic distress, remains to be seen. Much like victims of natural disasters, unsuspecting and increasingly delayed courts will find themselves totally overwhelmed. The inconvenience felt by the courts is distinct, however, from potential harm to financial investors. Although investors could also be harmed by these judicial conditions, they knowingly assumed certain financial risk when …
Debunking The Standardized Nature Of Insurance Policies, Elizabeth Sousa
Debunking The Standardized Nature Of Insurance Policies, Elizabeth Sousa
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
This article discredits the conventional view of insurance policies as standardized contracts that do not vary across insurance companies and policyholders. Contrary to this view, there are wide variations in policy language in both the admitted and non-admitted insurance markets. These deviations reduce the perceived benefit of insurance policies as standardized contracts intended to promote predictability and lower transaction costs for policyholders by focusing only on the most salient terms. Nowhere is this deviation more apparent than with Commercial General Liability (CGL) policies defendants are turning to in the current opioid litigation.
The opioid epidemic has been plaguing the United …
Delaware’S Dominance, Wyoming’S Dare: New Challenge, Same Outcome?, Pierluigi Matera
Delaware’S Dominance, Wyoming’S Dare: New Challenge, Same Outcome?, Pierluigi Matera
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Despite increasing criticism, Delaware’s dominance in corporate law has not experienced a significant decline: as of today, 67.8 percent of Fortune 500 companies are still incorporated in its jurisdiction. Nevada is known as Delaware’s most important competitor, with an aggressive strategy that has overridden the efforts of any other jurisdiction. Yet, its success has been limited to a specific market segment: small firms with low institutional shareholding and high insider ownership.
Scholars suggest several explanations for both the rise and the staying power of Delaware. These explanations are essentially subsumed under the credible commitment theory and the network theory. According …
Fixing Esg: Are Mandatory Esg Disclosures The Solution To Misleading Ratings?, Javier El-Hage
Fixing Esg: Are Mandatory Esg Disclosures The Solution To Misleading Ratings?, Javier El-Hage
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
This Note provides an overview of the debate around the current state of ESG disclosure practices, and the perceived need for the SEC to establish a system of mandatory ESG disclosures. Part I explores the inherent difficulty of defining ESG, the problematic nature of quantifying and measuring ESG factors, and the tools currently being used by market-leading ratings firms and investment vehicles. In particular, this part addresses the inconsistencies of ESG self-reporting, the influence of this practice on the ensuing ratings, and the potential for investors to be misled as a result.
Part II of the Note explores the possible …
The Seventh Circuit Missed The Bullseye In Walleye, Peter Rosenberg
The Seventh Circuit Missed The Bullseye In Walleye, Peter Rosenberg
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
The structure of agency relationships in a transaction should have no bearing on the outcome when the only difference between two hypothetical transactions is solely the facial structure. In the same vein, investor protection is at the forefront of the securities laws; commonly used limiting language for market announcements should not be enough to absolve a company from fraudulent disclosures, e.g., “preliminary results.”
In Walleye Trading LLC v. AbbVie, Inc., a Seventh Circuit decision, the Court did the opposite and found that, based on pleadings at the motion to dismiss stage, an issuer is not liable for the misstatements …
Who Makes Esg? Understanding Stakeholders In The Esg Debate, Matthew Diller, Stephanie Betts, Lorenzo Corte, David M. Silk, Scott V. Simpson, Lisa M. Fairfax, Carmen X. W. Lu, David H. Webber, Leo E. Strine, Jr., Sean J. Griffith
Who Makes Esg? Understanding Stakeholders In The Esg Debate, Matthew Diller, Stephanie Betts, Lorenzo Corte, David M. Silk, Scott V. Simpson, Lisa M. Fairfax, Carmen X. W. Lu, David H. Webber, Leo E. Strine, Jr., Sean J. Griffith
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
No abstract provided.
The Case For Accountability & Transparency: How Corporate Asset Forfeiture Creates A Conflict Of Interest, Tiffany J. Klinger
The Case For Accountability & Transparency: How Corporate Asset Forfeiture Creates A Conflict Of Interest, Tiffany J. Klinger
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Asset forfeiture is a tool used by law enforcement to seize property or profits related to criminal activity. Due to the public's growing distain of asset forfeiture, congressional and state reform has attempted to curtail the use of civil asset forfeiture over the past twenty years. However, little attention has been given where asset forfeiture is used against corporations. This Note sheds light as to how asset forfeiture is used against the organizational defendant and makes the following observations: First, asset forfeiture is a powerful tool in corporate criminal proceedings; however, forfeiture lacks the procedural restraints that are placed on …
The Eighteenth Annual Albert A. Destefano Lecture On Corporate, Securities, & Financial Law At The Fordham Corporate Law Center: Corwin V. Kkr Financial Holdings Llc— An “After-Action Report”, The Honorable Joseph R. Slights Iii, Matthew Diller
The Eighteenth Annual Albert A. Destefano Lecture On Corporate, Securities, & Financial Law At The Fordham Corporate Law Center: Corwin V. Kkr Financial Holdings Llc— An “After-Action Report”, The Honorable Joseph R. Slights Iii, Matthew Diller
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
No abstract provided.
Small Business Fintech Lending: The Need For Comprehensive Regulation, Lenore Palladino
Small Business Fintech Lending: The Need For Comprehensive Regulation, Lenore Palladino
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
The 28.7 million small businesses in the United States—99% of all American businesses—are the backbone of the American economy. Historically, small businesses relied on community banks for their credit needs. Over the last decade, however, small businesses increasingly have turned to “fintech” lenders—nonbank lenders that are largely unregulated. Nonbank consumer lending is governed by consumer protection statutes, but nonbank small business lending is outside of any clear regulatory framework that would protect borrowers from potentially predatory practices. This Article argues that the optimal regulatory regime is a combination of both state authority over fintech lenders and inclusion of small business …
List Voting’S Travels: The Importance Of Being Independent In The Boardroom, Maria Lucia Passador
List Voting’S Travels: The Importance Of Being Independent In The Boardroom, Maria Lucia Passador
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
The life of the law, especially with regard to corporations, is strongly influenced by experience and practice. The board, a living element of corporate law, is therefore one of the most noteworthy aspects to be studied, given its relevant implications and role as the lifeblood of scholarly debates.
This Article offers a novel contribution to the assessment of list voting, a fairly unique Italian system that has been increasingly appreciated by institutional investors. A hand-picked dataset that stretches from 2005 to 2015 shows a positive correlation between minority-appointed directors in the boardroom and dividend payouts. Furthermore, the findings shed light …
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: A Novel Agency Design With Familiar Issues, Thomas Arning
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: A Novel Agency Design With Familiar Issues, Thomas Arning
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
This Note examines the structure of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, with a specific focus on its single-director structure. The balance of authority between agencies and the three branches of government has been a point of contention for generations, especially since the early twentieth century. This area of the law became even more contested following the financial crisis in 2008. As part of the response to the perceived abuses that led to the global recession, Congress created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, ultimately opting to give it a single director as opposed to a board structure. Proponents of this regime …
Curb Your Enthusiasm: The Rise Of Hedge Fund Activist Shareholders And The Duty Of Loyalty, Soo Young Hong
Curb Your Enthusiasm: The Rise Of Hedge Fund Activist Shareholders And The Duty Of Loyalty, Soo Young Hong
Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law
Shareholder activism has been a growing problem in the corporate world, creating numerous dilemmas for the board of directors of companies. Activist shareholders can unsettle a company, pressuring the directors to make decisions according to the course of business the activists would prefer, and thus interfering with the traditional role of directors as the decision-makers of a company. With this new development in the business world, legal scholars have been debating if this activism needs to be controlled and, if so, what measures can be taken to reach a balance. This Note examines the traditional corporate principles such as the …