Business Organizations Law Commons^™

The Business Judgment Rule, Disclosure, And Executive Compensation, D. A. Jeremy Telman

Law Faculty Publications

Despite its ubiquity in corporate law, the business judgment rule remains a doctrinal puzzle. Both courts and scholars offer different understandings of the Rule's role in litigation brought against corporate directors and different justifications for its deployment to insulate such directors from liability for breaches of fiduciary duties. This Article rejects all existing justifications for the Rule and argues that the Rule is no longer needed to protect directors from liability either because the justifications offered never made any sense or because directors are now protected by other, statutory means. Rather, the Rule is needed today not to protect directors, …

Confidential Informants In Private Litigation: Balancing Interests In Anonymity And Disclosure, Ethan D. Wohl

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

Notification Of Data Security Breaches, Paul M. Schwartz, Edward J. Janger

Michigan Law Review

The law increasingly requires private companies to disclose information for the benefit of consumers. The latest examples of such regulation are state and federal laws that require companies to notify individuals of data security incidents involving their personal information. These laws, proposed in the wake of highly publicized data spills, seek to punish the breached entity and to protect consumers by requiring the entity to notify its customers about the security breach. There are competing approaches, however to how the law is to mandate release of information about data leaks. This Article finds that the current statutes' focus on reputational …

Dialectical Regulation, Robert B. Ahdieh

Faculty Scholarship

While theories of regulation abound, woefully inadequate attention has been given to growing patterns of "intersystemic" and "dialectical" regulation in the world today. In this rapidly expanding universe of interactions, independent regulatory agencies, born of autonomous jurisdictions, nonetheless face a combination of jurisdictional overlap with, and regulatory dependence on, one another. Here, the cross-jurisdictional interaction of regulators is no longer the voluntary interaction embraced by transnationalists; it is, instead, an unavoidable reality of acknowledgement and engagement, potentially culminating in the integration of discrete sets of regulatory rules into a collective whole.

Such patterns of regulatory engagement are increasingly evident, across …

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished? Establishing A Self-Evaluating Privilege For Corporate Internal Investigations, Theodore R. Lotchin

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Regulation Fd-Fairly Disruptive? An Increase In Capital Market Inefficiency, Peter Talosig Iii

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

Securities Law: Proxies Pull Mutual Funds Into The Sunlight: Mandatory Disclosure Of Proxy Voting Records, H. Anne Nicholson

Oklahoma Law Review

No abstract provided.

Executive Certification Requirements In The Sarbanes-Oxley Act Of 2002: A Case For Criminalizing Executive Recklessness, Christopher Wyant

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment focuses on sections 302 and 906 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Section 302 requires Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) and Chief Financial Officers (CFOs), or their equivalents, to personally certify the accuracy of financial disclosure filings required by the SEC and to vouch for the reliability of the internal corporate controls that produce that information.'4 Section 906 contains an additional certification requirement and provides specific criminal penalties for willful or knowing violations of that requirement.'" An efficiency-based analysis of these two sections of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act suggests that including a recklessness standard of intent would be more likely to increase …

Self-Regulation And Securities Markets, Adam C. Pritchard

Articles

Enron, Arthur Andersen, Tyco, ImClone, WorldCom, Adelphia - as American investors reel from accounting scandals and self-dealing by corporate insiders, the question of trust in the securities markets has taken on a new urgency. Securities markets cannot operate without trust. Markets known for fraud, insider trading, and manipulation risk a downward spiral as investors depart in search of safer investments. Today, many investors are rethinking the wisdom of entrusting their financial futures to the stock market. Absent trust in the integrity of the securities markets, individuals will hoard their money under the proverbial mattress.

Accounting, Steven Raymar, John Finnerty, Michael Zwecher

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

Keynote Address, Susan S. Bies, Alan Rechtschaffen

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

Proposals For Insider Trading Regulation After The Fall Of The House Of Enron, James P. Jalil

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

Business Law Reform In The United States: Thinking Too Small?, Douglas C. Michael

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Dean Johan Henning presents the South African experience with business entity reform as one part of a coordinated whole. It included, for example, government funding for business, tax reforms, accounting and securities changes. Henning says that these reforms, though multi-faceted, had a uniform purpose: to use small business as an engine to improve the economy and to move “historically and socially disadvantaged groups” into the mainstream of the economy and the society.

These are noble goals and far reaching efforts, and a lot to ask of business entity reform. But because the South African experience was nonetheless successful by all …

Key Disclosure Issues For Life Sciences Companies: Fda Product Approval, Clinical Test Results, And Government Inspections, William O. Fisher

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

The government, particularly the Food and Drug Administration ("FDA"), heavily regulates the life sciences industry. FDA actions can have an extraordinary influence on the fortunes of biotechnology companies. Timely FDA approval of a drug or medical device can permit a company to exploit an inviting market window. FDA product approval is, in turn, tied to clinical test results which demonstrate "efficacy" and safety. Delayed approval, unfavorable test results, or the denial of an FDA application may ruin a company. Beyond the FDA product approval process and related testing lie FDA inspections and the possibility that the government will investigate charges …

Leach Keynote Address, James A. Leach

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

The Policy Aspect, Consumer Data Privacy, Clyde Mitchell, Carl Howard, Oliver I. Ireland, Joel R. Reidenberg, Jay N. Soloway

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

On The Liability Of Corporate Directors To Holders Of Securities For Illegal Corporate Acts: Can The Tension Between The "Net-Loss" And "No-Duty-To-Disclose" Rules Be Resolved, Geoffrey Rapp

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

But Can She Keep The Car? Some Thoughts On Collateral Retention In Consumer Chapter 7 Cases, Marianne B. Culhane, Michaela M. White

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

Pandora’S Box: Managerial Discretion And The Problem Of Corporate Philanthropy, Faith Stevelman

Articles & Chapters

Corporate giving to 501(c)(3) nonprofits (“charities”) is a more curious, varied and interesting phenomenon than commentators have recognized. Such “gifts” can be grouped generally into four categories. First, Giving to executives’ preferred charities represents an alternative form of compensation. Second, corporate philanthropy is often tied to the company’s commercial advertising, as a method of promoting consumer goodwill and sales. Thirdly, some corporate gifts may be motivated by their leaders’ desire to “give back” to the community, as an expression of corporate social responsibility. Finally, corporations may use contributions to politically enabled nonprofits, including think tanks and market-oriented/ “public interest” litigation …

Reflections On Executive Compensation And A Modest Proposal For (Further) Reform, Mark J. Loewenstein

Publications

No abstract provided.

Dynamic Economic Analyses Of Selected Provisions Of Corporate Law: The Absolute Delegation Rule, Disclosure Of Intermediate Estimates And Ipo Pricing, Royce De R. Barondes

Faculty Publications

This Article examines three separate aspects of the relationships between corporations and their securityholders from a dynamic economic perspective: (i) the feasibility of permitting shareholders to participate in the management of their corporations through the exercise of voting rights, (ii) Rule 3b-6, the safe harbor for projections (the Safe Harbor)8 under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (the 1934 Act),9 and (iii) the extraordinary returns available from investing in initial public offerings (IPO's). Three particular dynamic aspects are implicated in these situations.

The Sec And The Future Of Corporate Governance, Mark J. Loewenstein

Publications

No abstract provided.

Corporate Pro-Choice: New York Assumes An Anti-Takover Position, Paula Walter

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Insiders, Options And The Fiduciary Principle: A Rule 10b-5 Loophole, Eric B. Lesser

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Note analyzes transactions involving the purchase and sale of option contracts by an insider possessing material nonpublic information to determine whether the insider violates section 10(b) or Rule 10(b)(5). This Note presents an overview of the framework of Rule 10(b)(5) and, in particular, its enforcement in insider trading cases, and then examines the differing views espoused by courts regarding the duty of disclosure. A general discussion of options and the options market is then provided. Finally, this Note illustrates the loophole by presenting a typical options scenario and then suggests applications of insider trading law the effectively closes the …

Corporations And Information: Secrecy, Access, And Disclosure, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Corporations and Information: Secrecy, Access, and Disclosure by Russell B. Stevenson, Jr.

Arkansas Corporate Fiduciary Standards—Interested Directors' Contracts And The Doctrine Of Corporate Opportunity, Susan Webber

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.

Competing Merger Offers - Disclosure And Related Problems, Law Review Staff

Vanderbilt Law Review

An attractive company that makes known its desire to find a merger partner or announces an agreement in principle to merge with another corporation is likely to receive multiple inquiries or multiple offers from acquisition-minded corporations. This Note examines various problems and duties confronting a publicly held company' that receives multiple merger inquiries and offers. The starting point for this analysis is one court's directive that a proxy statement soliciting shareholder approval of a merger recommended by management must disclose competing merger offers from third parties if such offers are "definitive" and "may" be more advantageous to the shareholders than …

Soft Information: The Sec's Former Exogenous Zone, Ted J. Fiflis

Publications

No abstract provided.

Financial Disclosure By Small Corporations, Russell J. Bruemmer

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This note will focus upon the desirability of compelling financial disclosure by corporations not subject to control under the existing federal securities legislation, which includes the vast majority of American corporations. While differing in degree and extent of application to corporations of varying sizes, the benefits derived from disclosure by large, widely-held corporations would also be obtained when disclosure is made by smaller, less widely-held corporations. The extension of federal or state disclosure requirements to corporations of all sizes and ownership dispersions, requiring them to place financial information before their shareholders at least once each year, is suggested.

Insider Securities Dealings During Corporate Crises, Victor Brudney

Michigan Law Review

The problem of assuring the fidelity of corporate insiders to the public investors in their enterprises figured prominently in legal literature and law reform proposals twenty-five or thirty years ago. In recent years, that question has attracted relatively less attention-in part because of the appearance or recognition of more significant problems in the relationship of publicly-held corporate enterprise to the national well-being, but in part also because of the development by courts, legislatures and administrative agencies-and to some extent by the insiders' community itself-of more exacting standards of loyalty. Recognition of broader obligations to their corporations and to public investors …