Securities Law Commons^™

Fraudulent Corporate Signals: Conduct As Securities Fraud, Manuel A. Utset

Scholarly Publications

Paying a dividend, repurchasing shares, underpricing an initial public offering, pledging collateral, and borrowing using short-term, instead of long-term debt, are all forms of corporate communications. They are “corporate signals” that tell investors certain things about a company’s operations and current financial position, and about the managers’ confidence in its future performance. This Article provides the first comprehensive analysis of the relationship between corporate signals and securities fraud. The incentive to communicate using corporate signals has increased in recent years, a phenomenon that, I argue, is due to the grow-ing complexity of public corporations, and, importantly, to a number of …

Enforcement Without Foundation? Insider Trading And China's Administrative Law Crisis, Nicholas C. Howson

Articles

China's securities regulator enforces insider trading prohibitions pursuant to non-legal and non-regulatory internal "guidance." Reported agency decisions indicate that enforcement against insider trading is often possible only pursuant to this guidance, as the behavior identified is far outside of the scope of insider trading liability provided for in statute or regulation. I argue that the agency guidance is itself unlawful and unenforceable, because: (i) the guidance is not the regulatory norm required by the statutory delegation of power; and (ii) the guidance is ultra vires because (a) it addresses something substantively different from what is authorized under the statutory delegation, …

Introduction: Insider Trading (Pli 2d Ed. 2006), Marc I. Steinberg, William K.S. Wang

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

This paper is the Introductory chapter to Insider Trading (PLI 2d ed. 2006). Insider Trading is a two-volume treatise that analyzes the application of various laws to stock market insider trading and tipping. Among the federal laws are Exchange Act section 10(b), SEC rule 10b-5, mail/wire fraud, SEC rule 14e-3, Exchange Act section 16, and Securities Act section 17(a). The state laws discussed are the common law, the Uniform Securities Act, and the California and New York securities statutes.

Another chapter addresses government enforcement of the insider trading/tipping prohibitions. A chapter on compliance programs deals with how firms can try …

A Reappraisal Of The Role Of Disclosure, Robert L. Knauss

Michigan Law Review

The objective of this paper is to assess the current role of disclosure in its various aspects in security regulation. Following a brief description of the current uses of disclosure in securities regulation, there are separate sections describing and evaluating (1) the obligation of disclosure imposed on issuers at the initial sale of securities, (2) the obligation of disclosure resting on issuers if they have securities which are traded, and (3) obligations of disclosure imposed on parties in the securities business other than issuers. This last section includes obligations of insiders, broker-dealers, and investment advisers, as well as duties of …

Securities Regulation-Federal Anti-Fraud Provisions-Applicability Of Insider Responsibility To Broker In Possession Of Inside Corporate Information, John A. Krsul Jr.

Michigan Law Review

During a period of upward movement in the price of Curtiss-Wright common stock, the corporation's board of directors voted to reduce the stock dividend by forty percent, an action certain to have an immediate adverse effect upon the stock's market price. Although the board immediately authorized the transmission of information concerning its action to the New York Stock Exchange, an inadvertent delay of forty-five minutes ensued. Unaware of the delay, C, a director of Curtiss-Wright and a registered representative of Cady, Roberts & Co. (registrant) , a registered broker-dealer, telephoned registrant to inform G, one of its partners, …

Corporations-Measure Of Short Swing Profits Under Section 16(B) Of The Securities Exchange Act Of 1934, G. B. Myers S.Ed.

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiff, a stockholder in X corporation, sued in the name of and on behalf of the corporation to recover short swing profits made by defendants in the sale of stock purchase warrants of the corporation, in violation of the Securities Exchange Act. Defendants were officers of the corporation and as part of the consideration for entering into their contracts of employment they received each year a number of these warrants. Within six months of the receipt of their 1945 warrants defendants had made certain sales of warrants then held by them. The court, in a previous ruling, had granted a …