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Asymmetric Stakes In Antitrust Litigation, Erik Hovenkamp, Steven C. Salop
Asymmetric Stakes In Antitrust Litigation, Erik Hovenkamp, Steven C. Salop
Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works
Private antitrust litigation often involves a dominant firm being accused of exclusionary conduct by a smaller rival or entrant. Importantly, the firms in such cases generally have asymmetric stakes: the defendant typically has a much larger financial interest on the line. We explore the broad policy implications of this fact using a novel model of litigation with endogenous effort. Asymmetric stakes lead dominant defendants to invest systematically more resources into litigation, causing the plaintiff's success probability to fall below the efficient level--a distortion that carries over to ex ante settlements. We explain that enhanced damages may reduce the problem, but …
A Mission Statement For Mutual Funds In Shareholder Litigation, Sean J. Griffith, Dorothy S. Lund
A Mission Statement For Mutual Funds In Shareholder Litigation, Sean J. Griffith, Dorothy S. Lund
Faculty Scholarship
This Article analyzes the conduct of mutual funds in shareholder litigation. We begin by reviewing the basic forms of shareholder litigation and the benefits such claims might offer mutual fund investors. We then investigate, through an in-depth docket review, whether and how the ten largest mutual funds participate in shareholder litigation. We find that although shareholder suits offer potential benefits, the largest mutual funds have essentially forfeited their use of litigation. This finding is particularly striking given that index funds and other long-term oriented mutual funds generally cannot sell their shares when they are dissatisfied with company performance, leaving them …