Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Institution
-
- Columbia Law School (9)
- Seattle University School of Law (8)
- University of Michigan Law School (8)
- Vanderbilt University Law School (6)
- University of Georgia School of Law (5)
-
- Selected Works (4)
- University of Colorado Law School (4)
- The Peter A. Allard School of Law (3)
- University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law (3)
- Washington and Lee University School of Law (3)
- Chicago-Kent College of Law (2)
- Pepperdine University (2)
- SelectedWorks (2)
- Texas A&M University School of Law (2)
- Boston University School of Law (1)
- Cleveland State University (1)
- Fordham Law School (1)
- Georgetown University Law Center (1)
- Maurer School of Law: Indiana University (1)
- SJ Quinney College of Law, University of Utah (1)
- The University of Akron (1)
- University of Florida Levin College of Law (1)
- University of Kentucky (1)
- University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School (1)
- University of Richmond (1)
- University of San Diego (1)
- Publication Year
- Publication
-
- Faculty Scholarship (15)
- Seattle University Law Review (8)
- Michigan Law Review (4)
- Publications (4)
- Scholarly Works (4)
-
- All Faculty Publications (3)
- All Faculty Scholarship (3)
- Vanderbilt Law Review (3)
- Book Chapters (2)
- Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications (2)
- Washington and Lee Law Review (2)
- Akron Law Review (1)
- Articles (1)
- Articles by Maurer Faculty (1)
- Cleveland State Law Review (1)
- Fordham Law Review (1)
- Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works (1)
- John W Verret (1)
- LLM Theses and Essays (1)
- Law & Economics Working Papers (1)
- Law Faculty Scholarly Articles (1)
- Lawrence J. Trautman Sr. (1)
- Pavlos E. Masouros (1)
- Pepperdine Law Review (1)
- Renee Jones (1)
- Richard A Booth (1)
- Robert B. Ahdieh (1)
- San Diego International Law Journal (1)
- The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law (1)
- UF Law Faculty Publications (1)
- Publication Type
Articles 1 - 30 of 73
Full-Text Articles in Law
A History Of Corporate Law Federalism In The Twentieth Century, William W. Bratton
A History Of Corporate Law Federalism In The Twentieth Century, William W. Bratton
Seattle University Law Review
This Article describes the emergence of corporate law federalism across a long twentieth century. The period begins with New Jersey’s successful initiation of charter competition in 1888 and ends with the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002. The federalism in question describes the interrelation of state and federal regulation of corporate internal affairs. This Article takes a positive approach, pursuing no normative bottom line. It makes six observations: (1) the federalism describes a division of subject matter, with internal affairs regulated by the states and securities issuance and trading regulated by the federal government; (2) the federalism is an …
The Structure Of Corporate Law Revolutions, William Savitt
The Structure Of Corporate Law Revolutions, William Savitt
Seattle University Law Review
Since, call it 1970, corporate law has operated under a dominant conception of governance that identifies profit-maximization for stockholder benefit as the purpose of the corporation. Milton Friedman’s essay The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase Its Profits, published in September of that year, provides a handy, if admittedly imprecise, marker for the coronation of the shareholder-primacy paradigm. In the decades that followed, corporate law scholars pursued an ever-narrowing research agenda with the purpose and effect of confirming the shareholder-primacy paradigm. Corporate jurisprudence followed a similar path, slowly at first and later accelerating, to discover in the precedents and …
The Failure Of Market Efficiency, William Magnuson
The Failure Of Market Efficiency, William Magnuson
Faculty Scholarship
Recent years have witnessed the near total triumph of market efficiency as a regulatory goal. Policymakers regularly proclaim their devotion to ensuring efficient capital markets. Courts use market efficiency as a guiding light for crafting legal doctrine. And scholars have explored in great depth the mechanisms of market efficiency and the role of law in promoting it. There is strong evidence that, at least on some metrics, our capital markets are indeed more efficient than they have ever been. But the pursuit of efficiency has come at a cost. By focusing our attention narrowly on economic efficiency concerns—such as competition, …
Hidden Agendas In Shareholder Voting, Scott Hirst, Adriana Z. Robertson
Hidden Agendas In Shareholder Voting, Scott Hirst, Adriana Z. Robertson
Faculty Scholarship
Nothing in either corporate or securities law requires companies to notify investors what they will be voting on before the record date for a shareholder meeting. We show that, overwhelmingly, they do not. The result is “hidden agendas”: for 88% of shareholder votes, investors cannot find out what they will be voting on before the record date. This poses an especially serious problem for investors who engage in securities lending: they must decide whether the expected benefit of voting exceeds the expected benefit of continuing to lend their shares (or making them available for lending) without knowing what they will …
Stewardship Theater, Jeff Schwartz
Stewardship Theater, Jeff Schwartz
Utah Law Faculty Scholarship
Large asset managers like BlackRock and Vanguard have amassed staggering equity holdings. The voting rights that accompany these holdings give them enormous power over many of the world’s largest companies. This unprecedented concentration of influence in a small group of financial intermediaries is a pressing policy concern. While law and finance literature on the topic has recently exploded, no one has offered a satisfying theory to explain their voting behavior. Existing work tries to understand their approach to voting in conventional terms—as an attempt to improve the performance of portfolio firms—but this is not why large asset managers vote the …
Shareholder Engagement In The United States, Vikramaditya S. Khanna
Shareholder Engagement In The United States, Vikramaditya S. Khanna
Book Chapters
Shareholder voting and engagement in the US have undergone substantial changes over the last 50 years. They have moved from being relatively sleepy issues to those that trigger insomnia in even the most hardened executives. The changes in the ownership structure of US publicly traded firms are probably the most important reason for the shift, but so too are rule changes that have facilitated greater shareholder activism. This chapter explores these developments while describing the rules of the road for shareholder voting in the US by focusing on Delaware jurisprudence and changes in US federal securities regulations. It also examines …
Do Esg Funds Deliver On Their Promises?, Quinn Curtis, Jill Fisch, Adriana Z. Robertson
Do Esg Funds Deliver On Their Promises?, Quinn Curtis, Jill Fisch, Adriana Z. Robertson
Michigan Law Review
Corporations have received growing criticism for contributing to climate change, perpetuating racial and gender inequality, and failing to address other pressing social issues. In response to these concerns, shareholders are increasingly focusing on environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) criteria in selecting investments, and asset managers are responding by offering a growing number of ESG mutual funds. The flow of assets into ESG is one of the most dramatic trends in asset management.
But are these funds giving investors what they promise? This question has attracted the attention of regulators, with the Department of Labor and the Securities and Exchange …
Delaware's Global Competitiveness, William J. Moon
Delaware's Global Competitiveness, William J. Moon
Faculty Scholarship
For about a hundred years, Delaware has been the leading jurisdiction for corporate law in the United States. The state, which deliberately embarked on a mission to build a haven for corporate law in the early twentieth century, now supplies corporate charters to over two thirds of Fortune 500 companies and a growing share of closely held companies. But Delaware’s domestic dominance masks the important and yet underexamined issue of whether Delaware maintains its competitive edge globally.
This Article examines Delaware’s global competitiveness, documenting Delaware’s surprising weakness competing in the emerging international market for corporate charters. It does so principally …
The Growth Of Vancouver As An Innovation Hub: Challenges And Opportunities, Camden Hutchison, Li-Wen Lin
The Growth Of Vancouver As An Innovation Hub: Challenges And Opportunities, Camden Hutchison, Li-Wen Lin
All Faculty Publications
This article assesses the development of Vancouver as an entrepreneurial region. Using data collected from commercial startup databases, we find that Vancouver produces more startups and receives more venture capital financing per capita than any other major Canadian city. However, we also find that Vancouver lags many U.S. cities on these same metrics. In light of our empirical findings, we explore whether differences in entrepreneurial activity between Canada and the United States are due to differences in the countries’ legal environments. We conclude that legal differences do not explain observed economic disparities, and that differences in entrepreneurial activity are due …
Federal Forum Provisions And The Internal Affairs Doctrine, Dhruv Aggarwal, Albert H. Choi
Federal Forum Provisions And The Internal Affairs Doctrine, Dhruv Aggarwal, Albert H. Choi
Law & Economics Working Papers
A key question at the intersection of state and federal law is whether corporations can use their charters or bylaws to restrict securities litigation to federal court. In December 2018, the Delaware Chancery Court answered this question in the negative in the landmark decision Sciabacucchi v. Salzberg. The court invalidated “federal forum provisions” (“FFPs”) that allow companies to select federal district courts as the exclusive venue for claims brought under the Securities Act of 1933 (“1933 Act”). The decision held that the internal affairs doctrine, which is the bedrock of U.S. corporate law, does not permit charter and bylaw provisions …
Working Hard Or Making Work? Plaintiffs' Attorneys Fees In Securities Fraud Class Actions, Stephen J. Choi, Jessica Erickson, A. C. Pritchard
Working Hard Or Making Work? Plaintiffs' Attorneys Fees In Securities Fraud Class Actions, Stephen J. Choi, Jessica Erickson, A. C. Pritchard
Articles
In this article, we study attorney fees awarded in the largest securities class actions: “mega- settlements.” Consistent with prior work, we find larger fee awards but lower percentages in these cases. We also find that courts are more likely to reject or modify fee requests made in connection with the largest settlements. We conjecture that this scrutiny provides an incentive for law firms to bill more hours, not to advance the case, but to help justify large fee awards—“make work.” The results of our empirical tests are consistent with plaintiffs’ attorneys investing more time in litigation against larger companies, with …
The Misuse Of Tobin’S Q, Robert Bartlett, Frank Partnoy
The Misuse Of Tobin’S Q, Robert Bartlett, Frank Partnoy
Vanderbilt Law Review
In recent years, scholars have addressed the most important topics in corporate law based on a flawed assumption: that the ratio of the market value of a corporation’s securities to their book value is a valid measure of the value of the corporation. The topics have included staggered boards, incorporation in Delaware, shareholder activism, dual-class share structures, share ownership, board diversity, and other significant aspects of corporate governance. We trace the history of this flawed assumption, and document how it emerged from Tobin’s q, a concept from an unrelated area in macroeconomics. We show that scholars have misused Tobin’s q, …
Delaware's New Competition, William J. Moon
Delaware's New Competition, William J. Moon
Faculty Scholarship
According to the standard account in American corporate law, states compete to supply corporate law to American corporations, with Delaware dominating the market. This “competition” metaphor in turn informs some of the most important policy debates in American corporate law.
This Article complicates the standard account, introducing foreign nations as emerging lawmakers that compete with American states in the increasingly globalized market for corporate law. In recent decades, entrepreneurial foreign nations in offshore islands have used permissive corporate governance rules and specialized business courts to attract publicly traded American corporations. Aided in part by a select group of private sector …
Social Activism Through Shareholder Activism, Lisa M. Fairfax
Social Activism Through Shareholder Activism, Lisa M. Fairfax
Washington and Lee Law Review
This article is based on the author's keynote address at the 2018-2019 Lara D. Gass Annual Symposium: Civil Rights and Shareholder Activism at Washington and Lee University School of Law, February 15, 2019.
In 1952, the SEC altered the shareholder proposal rule to exclude proposals made “primarily for the purpose of promoting general economic, political, racial, religious, social or similar causes.” The SEC did not reference civil rights activist James Peck or otherwise acknowledge that its actions were prompted by Peck’s 1951 shareholder proposal to Greyhound for desegregating seating. Instead, the SEC indicated that its change simply reflected a codification …
Chancery’S Greatest Decision: Historical Insights On Civil Rights And The Future Of Shareholder Activism, Omari Scott Simmons
Chancery’S Greatest Decision: Historical Insights On Civil Rights And The Future Of Shareholder Activism, Omari Scott Simmons
Washington and Lee Law Review
This article builds upon the author's remarks at the 2018-2019 Lara D. Gass Annual Symposium: Civil Rights and Shareholder Activism at Washington and Lee University School of Law, February 15, 2019.
Shareholder activism—using an equity stake in a corporation to influence management—has become a popular tool to effectuate social change in the twenty-first century. Increasingly, activists are looking beyond financial performance to demand better corporate performance in such areas as economic inequality, civil rights, human rights, discrimination, and diversity. These efforts take many forms: publicity campaigns, litigation, proxy battles, shareholder resolutions, and negotiations with corporate management. However, a consensus on …
Nonvoting Shares And Efficient Corporate Governance, Dorothy S. Lund
Nonvoting Shares And Efficient Corporate Governance, Dorothy S. Lund
Faculty Scholarship
A growing number of technology companies, including Google, Zillow, and Snap, have issued stock that does not allow investors to vote on corporate decisions. But there is fundamental disagreement among scholars and investors about whether nonvoting stock is beneficial or harmful. Critics argue that nonvoting shares perpetually insulate corporate insiders from influence and oversight, and therefore increase agency costs. By contrast, proponents contend that nonvoting shares may provide benefits that exceed these agency costs, such as enabling corporate insiders to pursue their long-term vision for the company without interference from outside shareholders.
This Article offers a novel perspective on this …
From "Federalization" To "Mixed Governance" In Corporate Law: A Defense Of Sarbanes-Oxley, Robert B. Ahdieh
From "Federalization" To "Mixed Governance" In Corporate Law: A Defense Of Sarbanes-Oxley, Robert B. Ahdieh
Robert B. Ahdieh
Since the very moment of its adoption, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 has been subject to a litany of critiques, many of them seemingly well-placed. The almost universal condemnation of the Act for its asserted 'federalization' of corporate law, by contrast, deserves short shrift. Though widely invoked - and blithely accepted - dissection of this argument against the legislation shows it to rely either on flawed assumptions or on normative preferences not ordinarily acknowledged (or perhaps even accepted) by those who criticize Sarbanes-Oxley for its federalization of state corporate law.
Once we appreciate as much, we can begin by replacing …
The Evolution Of Entrepreneurial Finance: A New Typology, J. Brad Bernthal
The Evolution Of Entrepreneurial Finance: A New Typology, J. Brad Bernthal
Publications
There has been an explosion in new types of startup finance instruments. Whereas twenty years ago preferred stock dominated the field, startup companies and investors now use at least eight different instruments—six of which have only become widely used in the last decade. Legal scholars have yet to reflect upon the proliferation of instrument types in the aggregate. Notably missing is a way to organize instruments into a common framework that highlights their similarities and differences.
This Article makes four contributions. First, it catalogues the variety of startup investment forms. I describe novel instruments, such as revenue-based financing, which remain …
The Shifting Tides Of Merger Litigation, Randall Thomas, Matthew D. Cain, Jill Fisch, Steven D. Solomon
The Shifting Tides Of Merger Litigation, Randall Thomas, Matthew D. Cain, Jill Fisch, Steven D. Solomon
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
In 2015, Delaware made several important changes to its laws concerning merger litigation. These changes, which were made in response to a perception that levels of merger litigation were too high and that a substantial proportion of merger cases were not providing value, raised the bar, making it more difficult for plaintiffs to win a lawsuit challenging a merger and more difficult for plaintiffs’ counsel to collect a fee award. We study what has happened in the courts in response to these changes. We find that the initial effect of the changes has been to decrease the volume of merger …
Center-Left Politics And Corporate Governance: What Is The 'Progressive' Agenda?, Christopher Bruner
Center-Left Politics And Corporate Governance: What Is The 'Progressive' Agenda?, Christopher Bruner
Scholarly Works
For as long as corporations have existed, debates have persisted among scholars, judges, and policymakers regarding how best to describe their form and function as a positive matter, and how best to organize relations among their various stakeholders as a normative matter. This is hardly surprising given the economic and political stakes involved with control over vast and growing "corporate" resources, and it has become commonplace to speak of various approaches to corporate law in decidedly political terms. In particular, on the fundamental normative issue of the aims to which corporate decision-making ought to be directed, shareholder-centric conceptions of the …
Does Shareholder Voting Matter? Evidence From The Takeover Market, Paul Mason, Usha Rodrigues, Mike Stegemoller, Steven Utke
Does Shareholder Voting Matter? Evidence From The Takeover Market, Paul Mason, Usha Rodrigues, Mike Stegemoller, Steven Utke
Scholarly Works
Voting rights are a basic shareholder-protection mechanism. Outside of the core voting requirements state law imposes (election of directors and votes on fundamental changes), federal law grants shareholders additional voting rights. But these rights introduce concomitant costs into corporate governance. Each grant of a voting right thus invites the question: is the benefit achieved worth the cost the vote imposes?
The question is not merely a theoretical one. Recently the SEC, concerned about Nasdaq’s potential weakening of shareholder voting protections, has lamented that little evidence exists on the value of the shareholder vote. This Article provides that evidence. It examines …
Corporate Governance, Capital Markets, And Securities Law, Adam C. Pritchard
Corporate Governance, Capital Markets, And Securities Law, Adam C. Pritchard
Book Chapters
This chapter explores the dividing line between corporate governance and securities law from both historical and institutional perspectives. Section 2 examines the origins of the dividing line between securities law and corporate governance in the United States, as well as the efforts of the SEC to push against that boundary. That history sets the stage for section 3, which broadens the inquiry by examining the institutional connections between capital markets and corporate governance. Are there practical limits to the connection between securities law and corporate governance? The US again illustrates the point, as Congress has increasingly crossed the traditional boundary …
Sexual Harassment And Corporate Law, Daniel Hemel, Dorothy S. Lund
Sexual Harassment And Corporate Law, Daniel Hemel, Dorothy S. Lund
Faculty Scholarship
The #MeToo movement has shaken corporate America in recent months, leading to the departures of several high-profile executives as well as sharp stock price declines at a number of firms. Investors have taken notice and taken action: Shareholders at more than a half dozen publicly traded companies have filed lawsuits since the start of 2017 alleging that corporate fiduciaries breached state law duties or violated federal securities laws in connection with sexual harassment scandals. Additional suits are likely in the coming months.
This Article examines the role of corporate and securities law in regulating and remedying workplace sexual misconduct. We …
Quieting The Shareholders' Voice, Randall Thomas, James D. Cox, Fabrizio Ferri
Quieting The Shareholders' Voice, Randall Thomas, James D. Cox, Fabrizio Ferri
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
No abstract provided.
The Sum Of Its Parts: The Lawyer-Client Relationship In Initial Public Offerings, Jeremy R. Mcclane
The Sum Of Its Parts: The Lawyer-Client Relationship In Initial Public Offerings, Jeremy R. Mcclane
Fordham Law Review
This Article examines the impact of the quality of a lawyer's working relationship with his or her client on one of the most important types of capital markets deal in a company's existence: its initial public offering (IPO). Drawing on data from interviews with equity capital markets lawyers at major law firms, and analyzing data from IPOs in the United States registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission between June 1996 and December 2010, this study finds a strong association between several measures of IPO performance and the familiarity between the lead underwriter and its counsel, as measured by the …
Four Pillars To Build A New Corporate Law Federalism: Crowd Funding Exchanges, A Codified Internal Affairs Doctrine, City-Based Incorporation, And An Arbitrated Corporate Code, J.W. Verret
John W Verret
This article examines the event window opened by the pending creation of new crowdfunding platforms, a new means of creating publicly traded equity for smaller, early stage firms than have ever been permitted by the Securities and Exchange Commission to access the public securities markets. That event window could support a completely new paradigm for the development of corporation law and completely upend existing wisdom about interstate competition to develop corporate governance. This article considers the economics of crowdfunding precursors which share some of the attributes of equity crowdfunding, and also considers the expected attributes of equity crowdfunding, to demonstrate …
Is The Quest For Corporate Responsibility A Wild Goose Chase? The Story Of Lovenheim V. Iroquois Brands, Ltd., D.A. Jeremy Telman
Is The Quest For Corporate Responsibility A Wild Goose Chase? The Story Of Lovenheim V. Iroquois Brands, Ltd., D.A. Jeremy Telman
Akron Law Review
This Article is a Law Story. Law Stories have many purposes, but their main goal is to supplement and demystify the case method of legal pedagogy. The case method has been criticized for presenting students with the law more or less as a fait accompli. The case method assumes a pre-existing body of law that students passively learn rather than learning to think of the law as something that they will have a hand in shaping...In Part II, this Article explores the law of shareholder proposals and the reasons why the SEC and the courts permit proposals relating to social …
The Short Road Home To Delaware: Boilermakers Local 154 Retirement Fund V. Chevron, Anne M. Tucker
The Short Road Home To Delaware: Boilermakers Local 154 Retirement Fund V. Chevron, Anne M. Tucker
The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law
One of the biggest Delaware Supreme Court cases of 2013 wasn’t. The Delaware Court of Chancery opinion in Boilermakers Local 154 Retirement Fund v. Chevron Corp., upheld the enforceability of Delaware forum selection clause bylaws unilaterally adopted by corporate boards of directors. It was widely expected that the Delaware Supreme Court would uphold the Court of Chancery’s opinion. However, Plaintiffs dismissed their appeal and moved to dismiss their remaining claims in the Court of Chancery, leaving intact Chancellor Strine’s strong support of forum selection clauses. National Industries Group (Holding) v. Carlyle Investment Managements L.L.C. and TC Group, L.L.C., a 2013 …
Downstream Securities Regulation, Anita Krug
Downstream Securities Regulation, Anita Krug
All Faculty Scholarship
Securities regulation wears two hats. Its “upstream” side governs firms in connection with their obtaining financing in the securities markets. That is, it regulates firms’ and issuers’ offers and sales of securities, whether in public offerings to retail investors or in private offerings to institutional investors. Its “downstream” side, by contrast, governs financial services providers, who assist with investors’ activities in those markets. Their services include providing advice regarding securities investments, as investment advisers do; aggregating investors’ assets for purposes of enabling those investors to invest their assets collectively, as mutual funds do; and acting as “middlemen” between buyers and …
A Canadian Model Of Corporate Governance: Where Do Shareholders Really Stand?, Carol Liao
A Canadian Model Of Corporate Governance: Where Do Shareholders Really Stand?, Carol Liao
All Faculty Publications
This feature article in the Director Journal summarizes the findings from the report, "A Canadian Model of Corporate Governance: Insights from Canada's Leading Legal Practitioners," produced for the Canadian Foundation for Governance Research and the Institute of Corporate Directors (also available on SSRN).
In the report, interviews were conducted with 32 leading senior legal practitioners across Canada to opine on the fundamental principles that are driving the development of Canadian corporate governance. The report found that Canadian common law has made the process of considering stakeholders in the "best interests of the corporation" more overt, well beyond what is assumed …