Law Commons^™

Private Equity's Three Lessons For Agency Theory, William Wilson Bratton

Articles

It is time to consider the lessons to be learned from the recent boom in private equity buyouts, not least in view of its abrupt termination in the wake of tightened credit. In the past, such inquiries have been undertaken in the context of agency theory and have focused on the buyout's implications for solving the problem of separation of ownership and control. This article reverses the pattern of inquiry to consider the buyout's implications for agency theory, pointing to three lessons. The first lesson addresses agency theory's three-way association among control transfers, governance discipline and hostile takeovers, suggesting that …

Deconstructing Equity: Public Ownership, Agency Costs, And Complete Capital Markets, Charles K. Whitehead, Ronald J. Gilson

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

The traditional law and finance focus on agency costs presumes that the premise that diversified public shareholders are the cheapest risk bearers is immutable. In this Essay, we raise the possibility that changes in the capital markets have called this premise into question, drawn into sharp relief by the recent private equity wave in which the size and range of public companies being taken private expanded significantly. In brief, we argue that private owners, in increasingly complete markets, can transfer risk in discrete slices to counterparties who, in turn, can manage or otherwise diversify away those risks they choose to …

Deconstructing Equity: Public Ownership, Agency Costs, And Complete Capital Markets, Ronald J. Gilson, Charles K. Whitehead

Charles K Whitehead