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Full-Text Articles in Law
An Approach To The Regulation Of Spanish Banking Foundations, Miguel Martínez
An Approach To The Regulation Of Spanish Banking Foundations, Miguel Martínez
Miguel Martínez
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the legal framework governing banking foundations as they have been regulated by Spanish Act 26/2013, of December 27th, on savings banks and banking foundations. Title 2 of this regulation addresses a construct that is groundbreaking for the Spanish legal system, still of paramount importance for the entire financial system insofar as these foundations become the leading players behind certain banking institutions given the high interest that foundations hold in the share capital of such institutions.
Optimized Theft: Why Some Controlling Shareholders “Generously” Expropriate From Minority Shareholders, Sang Yop Kang
Optimized Theft: Why Some Controlling Shareholders “Generously” Expropriate From Minority Shareholders, Sang Yop Kang
Sang Yop Kang
Although controlling shareholder agency problems have been well studied so far, many questions still remain unanswered. In particular, an important puzzle in a bad-law jurisdiction is: why some controlling shareholders (“roving controllers”) loot the entire corporate assets at once, and why others (“stationary controllers”) siphon a part of corporate assets on a continuous basis. To solve this conundrum, this Article provides analytical frameworks exploring the behaviors and motivations of controlling shareholders. To begin with, I reinterpret Olson’s political theory of “banditry” in the context of corporate governance in developing countries. Based on a new taxonomy of controlling shareholders (“roving controllers” …
Target, Negligence, Chips, And Chickens, Jesse D. Gossett
Target, Negligence, Chips, And Chickens, Jesse D. Gossett
Jesse D Gossett
SHOPPING ON BLACK FRIDAY. It’s almost as American as baseball and apple pie. But during the 2013 holiday season, over forty million U.S. citizens experienced what is increasingly becoming a uniquely American problem: face-to-face (“FTF”) credit card fraud. This online article briefly explores the problems of data hacking and credit card fraud. It then looks at how European countries have largely avoided the problem and what American consumers can do to minimize the problem here.
Present At The Creation: Reflections On The Early Years Of The National Association Of Corporate Directors, Lawrence J. Trautman
Present At The Creation: Reflections On The Early Years Of The National Association Of Corporate Directors, Lawrence J. Trautman
Lawrence J. Trautman Sr.
Effective corporate governance is critical to the productive operation of the global economy and preservation of our way of life. Excellent governance execution is also required to achieve economic growth and robust job creation in any country. In the United States, the premier director membership organization is the National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD). Since 1978, NACD plays a major role in fostering excellence in corporate governance in the United States and beyond. The NACD has grown from a mere realization of the importance of corporate governance to become the only national membership organization created by and for corporate directors. …
Remembering George Michaely, Lawrence J. Trautman, Stanley Sporkin, John A. Dudley
Remembering George Michaely, Lawrence J. Trautman, Stanley Sporkin, John A. Dudley
Lawrence J. Trautman Sr.
This short essay is a memorial tribute about George P. Michaely, Jr. (1926 to 2014). After graduating from both the University of Notre Dame and its law school, he began his legal career, serving for approximately seven years as attorney in the Office of General Counsel. He was then appointed Chief Counsel of the Commission’s Division of Corporation Finance, where he served for approximately the next four years and was responsible for advising the Commission and the public concerning the interpretation of the statutory provisions and rules relating to the registration provisions of the Securities Act of 1933 and the …
Financial Institution Executive Compensation: The Problem Of Financially Motivated Excessive Risk-Taking, The Regulatory Response, And Common Sense Solutions, Jesse D. Gossett
Financial Institution Executive Compensation: The Problem Of Financially Motivated Excessive Risk-Taking, The Regulatory Response, And Common Sense Solutions, Jesse D. Gossett
Jesse D Gossett
This article addresses the issue of executive compensation at financial institutions as it relates to encouraging excessive risk-taking at these firms. First, I examine the economics of compensation and its relationship to risk-taking at financial firms. Next, I take a critical look at compensation provisions of Dodd-Frank (and to a lesser extent, Sarbanes-Oxley) and describe not only what Dodd-Frank does, but more importantly what it does not do. I then make specific recommendations for rules regulators should adopt under Dodd-Frank for the purpose of using compensation plans as a way of reducing excessive risk at financial institutions. I make these …
Controlling Shareholders: Benevolent “King” Or Ruthless “Pirate”, Sang Yop Kang
Controlling Shareholders: Benevolent “King” Or Ruthless “Pirate”, Sang Yop Kang
Sang Yop Kang
Unfair self-dealing and expropriation of minority shareholders by a controlling shareholder are common business practices in developing countries (“bad-law countries”). Although controlling shareholder agency problems have been well studied so far, there are many questions unanswered in relation to behaviors and motivations of controlling shareholders. For example, a puzzle is that some controlling shareholders in bad-law countries voluntarily extract minority shareholders less than other controlling shareholders. Applying Mancur Olson’s framework of political theory of “banditry” to the context of corporate governance, this Article proposes that there are at least two categories of controlling shareholders. “Roving controllers” are dominant shareholders with …
E-Commerce And Electronic Payment System Risks: Lessons From Paypal, Lawrence J. Trautman
E-Commerce And Electronic Payment System Risks: Lessons From Paypal, Lawrence J. Trautman
Lawrence J. Trautman Sr.
What are the major risks perceived by those engaged in e-commerce and electronic payment systems? What development risks, if they become reality, may cause substantial increases in operating costs or threaten the very survival of the enterprise? This article utilizes the relevant annual report disclosures from eBay (parent of PayPal), along with other eBay and PayPal documents, as a potentially powerful teaching device. Most of the descriptive language to follow is excerpted directly from eBay’s regulatory filings. My additions include weaving these materials into a logical presentation and providing supplemental sources for those who desire a deeper look (usually in …
Financial Armageddon Routs Law Again, Nicholas L. Georgakopoulos
Financial Armageddon Routs Law Again, Nicholas L. Georgakopoulos
Nicholas L Georgakopoulos
This essay, after highlighting the unique aspects of financial markets, offers a mostly rational account for financial crises, centering on the 2008 crisis as an example. The thesis is that market participants overestimate the duration of high productivity growth due to new technologies and produce occasional—and likely unavoidable—bubbles. Considering potential changes in the regulation of financial markets, the conclusion is grim. Regulators appear to have exhausted the effective legal levers against overestimations of continued high growth. The legislative responses to the last few crises were likely unproductive. The sole (but still unrealistic) effective protection would be the constitutional development of …
Present At The Creation: Reflections On The Early Years Of The National Association Of Corporate Directors, Lawrence J. Trautman
Present At The Creation: Reflections On The Early Years Of The National Association Of Corporate Directors, Lawrence J. Trautman
Lawrence J. Trautman Sr.
Effective corporate governance is critical to the productive operation of the global economy and preservation of our way of life. Excellent governance execution is also required to achieve economic growth and robust job creation in any country. In the United States, the premier director membership organization is the National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD). Now over 36 years old, NACD plays a major role in fostering excellence in corporate governance in the United States and beyond. Over the past thirty-six years NACD has grown from a mere realization of the importance of corporate governance to become the only national membership …
Will Law Firms Go Public?, Roberta S. Karmel
Will Law Firms Go Public?, Roberta S. Karmel
Roberta S. Karmel
Law in the United States is a big business and big law firms are a global business. Currently, under rules of the American Bar Association (ABA) and most states law, firms are not allowed either to include non-lawyers as partners or accept equity investments from non-lawyers. This Article will argue that (even if law firms retain the form of partnerships) they eventually will accept investments from third parties, and possibly even go public, but this development could lead to a loss of professionalism, as it has with other industries, and could also lead to the end of self-regulation. Among the …
Neoliberalism And The Law: How Historical Materialism Can Illuminate Recent Governmental And Judicial Decision Making, Justin Schwartz
Neoliberalism And The Law: How Historical Materialism Can Illuminate Recent Governmental And Judicial Decision Making, Justin Schwartz
Justin Schwartz
Neoliberalism can be understood as the deregulation of the economy from political control by deliberate action or inaction of the state. As such it is both constituted by the law and deeply affects it. I show how the methods of historical materialism can illuminate this phenomenon in all three branches of the the U.S. government. Considering the example the global financial crisis of 2007-08 that began with the housing bubble developing from trade in unregulated and overvalued mortgage backed securities, I show how the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, which established a firewall between commercial and investment banking, allowed this …
Rise Of The Intercontinentalexchange And Implications Of Its Merger With Nyse Euronext, Latoya C. Brown
Rise Of The Intercontinentalexchange And Implications Of Its Merger With Nyse Euronext, Latoya C. Brown
Latoya C. Brown, Esq.
This paper examines the impending merger between the IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) and NYSE Euronext against the backdrop of the current structure of the global financial services industry. The paper concludes that the merger embodies what the financial services industry is becoming and captures the model that will allow exchanges to remain competitive in today’s marketplace: mega-exchanges with broader asset classes and electronic platforms. As technology and globalization threaten their vitality, exchanges will need to continue reinventing and adapting. Increasingly over the last decade they have done so by merging and by moving, at least a part of, their operations on screen. …
Regulation Not Prohibition: The Comparative Case Against The Insurable Interest Doctrine, Sharo Michael Atmeh
Regulation Not Prohibition: The Comparative Case Against The Insurable Interest Doctrine, Sharo Michael Atmeh
Sharo M Atmeh
American law requires an insurable interest—a pecuniary or affective stake in the subject of an insurance policy—as a predi-cate to properly obtaining insurance. In theory, the rule prevents both wagering on individual lives and moral hazard. In practice, the doctrine is avoided by complex insurance transaction structuring to effectuate both origination and transfers of insurance by individuals without an insurable interest. This paper argues that it is time to ab-andon the insurable interest doctrine. As both the English and Aus-tralian experiences indicate, elimination of the insurable interest doctrine will have little detrimental pecuniary effect on the insurance industry, while freeing …