Business Organizations Law Commons^™

Timing Whistleblowing, Andrew K. Jennings

Faculty Articles

Whistleblower programs (WBPs) expose hidden corporate wrongdoing. They do so by offering retaliation protection and financial bounties to those who bring original information to law enforcement about unseen, and often complex, misconduct. Under a standard account, whistleblowing serves the public interest by increasing the ex post detection of illegal activity and the ex ante risk of its exposure. That standard view—which centers whistleblowing on detecting wrongdoing—is incomplete, however. To present a fuller view, this Article introduces a complementary model that refocuses whistleblowing as preventing wrongdoing. Working together, these models show that a WBP can do more than enable detection at …

Capital Formation, The Sec, And Accredited Investors, Neal F. Newman, Lawrence J. Trautman, Brian Elzweig

Faculty Scholarship

Protecting the investing public, while simultaneously facilitating the efficient flow of capital needed by all new and growing businesses continues as a primary responsibility of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Enhancing the capital formation process is a necessary step in the creation of jobs and growth of any economy. Central to the SEC’s regulatory schematic is the proposition that some particularly sophisticated and wealthy investors require less protection than those with less knowledge, experience, and resources. During December 2023, for just the third time, the SEC staff issued a report examining the status of the natural person accredited …

The Employees’ Dilemma: Balancing Internal Reporting, Whistleblowing, And Insider Trading Risks, Geeyoung Min

Seattle University Law Review

The Essay examines how recent developments in insider trading regulations and whistleblower reward programs can lead to unintended and counterproductive results of discouraging employees from using internal reporting channels within corporate compliance programs. While the presence of a robust and well-functioning corporate compliance program is a critical factor both in mitigating the level of public enforcement actions against companies and in protecting corporate managers from liability in private litigation, these programs often provide little incentive for employees to report potential misconduct internally.

Corporate compliance programs are designed to promote the upward information flow within the company, which is essential for …

Voting Matters: Materiality Considerations And The Shareholder Vote, Renee M. Jones

Seattle University Law Review

For the shareholder franchise to have meaning, shareholders must have access to relevant information to inform their voting decisions. The securities laws’ disclosure requirements play an essential role in informing the shareholder vote.

This Essay focuses on the question of the materiality of information in the context of shareholder voting. It addresses the question of whether ESG-related information is material, positioning the materiality inquiry within the context of shareholders’ voting decisions. It explores the definition of materiality with a focus on the “reasonable investor” concept embedded within the definition. The Essay argues that the implicit expectations of many commentators that …

Gen Y More Black Corporate Directors, Chaz Brooks

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

Corporate diversity has been in the spotlight for decades. Recent efforts have followed years of legal scholarship, arguments on the business rationale for greater diversity, and more recently, the racial unrest during the summer of 2020. Called by some, a “racial reckoning,” the summer of 2020 catalyzed many corporate declarations on the importance of diversity, and more to the point of this article, the necessity of righting the economic disadvantages of Black Americans. This article looks specifically at one intervention by a corporate player following summer 2020, Nasdaq’s volley to increase corporate diversity through required disclosure. This article reviews the …

Unflexed Muscle: Sec Enforcement And Officer Sox 302 Certifications, Marc I. Steinberg, A.B. Steinberg

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

This article represents the first work to analyze the Securities and Exchange Commission’s neglect in its enforcement of the chief executive officer (CEO) and chief financial officer (CFO) Sarbanes-Oxley certification requirement. The article addresses the appropriate construction of the statute’s reach, the enforcement proceedings instituted by the SEC under this provision, and the Commission’s failure to fulfill its legislative directive to enforce this statute and Rule 13a-14 promulgated thereunder. In its implementation of the CEO and CFO certification requirement, the SEC has brought relatively few enforcement actions during over a two-decade period. Its enforcement with respect to CEOs and CFOs …

The Impossibility Of Corporate Political Ideology: Upholding Sec Climate Disclosures Against Compelled Commercial Speech Challenges, Erin Murphy

Northwestern University Law Review

To address the increasingly dire climate crisis, the SEC will require public companies to reveal their business’s environmental impact to the market through climate disclosures. Businesses and states challenged the required disclosures as compelled, politically motivated speech that risks putting First Amendment doctrine into further jeopardy. In the past five years, the U.S. Supreme Court has demonstrated an increased propensity to hear compelled speech cases and rule in favor of litigants claiming First Amendment protection from disclosing information that they disagree with or believe to be a politically charged topic. Dissenting liberal Justices have decried these practices as “weaponizing the …

A Look Back In Time: Analyzing The Success And Value Of The 2014 Amendments To Rule 2a-7 And Reporting On Form N-Cr In Light Of The March 2020 Market Events, Jocelyn Near

Catholic University Law Review

Money market funds have frequently been a target of regulation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”). Perhaps the most expansive regulation came as a response to the 2008 financial crisis, in which the Reserve Primary Fund “broke the buck.” The SEC’s misguided 2014 reforms exacerbated the inherent risks of money market funds, including the risk of runs and first mover advantage, particularly with the implementation of Form N-CR. Form N-CR requires a money market fund to publicly report when various events occur, including when a retail or government money market fund’s current net asset value per share deviates downward …

Disclosure, Greenwashing, And The Future Of Esg Litigation, Barbara Ballan, Jason J. Czarnezki

Washington and Lee Law Review

The Environmental, Social, and Governance (“ESG”) disclosure movement is expanding both voluntarily, as businesses choose to disclose this information, and mandatorily, as government agencies impose disclosure requirements. As ESG disclosure expands, so do the litigation risks. “Greenwashing” refers to presenting false or misleading environmental or sustainability (i.e., “green”) qualities of products, services, or practices. Businesses may greenwash consumers as well as investors with false and misleading ESG disclosures in advertising, securities filings, or other public statements activating greenwashing litigation from investors and consumers. This Article addresses (1) the laws and regulations that cover consumer and securities greenwashing litigation, (2) how …

Delegated Corporate Voting And The Deliberative Franchise, Sarah C. Haan

Scholarly Articles

Starting in the 1930s with the earliest version of the proxy rules, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has gradually increased the proportion of “instructed” votes on the shareholder’s proxy card until, for the first time in 2022, it required a fully instructed proxy card. This evolution effectively shifted the exercise of the shareholder’s vote from the shareholders’ meeting to the vote delegation that occurs when the share-holder fills out the proxy card. The point in the electoral process when the binding voting choice is communicated is now the execution of the proxy card (assuming the shareholder completes the card …

Reconciling Disjunct Cryptocurrency Securities Enforcement With Purchaser Expectations, Jacob E. Simmons

Seattle University Law Review

The Southern District of New York’s July 2023 decision in SEC v. Ripple Labs, Inc. has been touted as a monumental win for cryptocurrency purchasers and related businesses. The Ripple court held that, except institutional investor transactions, all sales of Ripple’s XRP token were not investment contracts, a class of security subject to federal securities law. The court’s ruling meant that Ripple could not be held liable for the unregistered trading of XRP beyond its sales to institutional investors. Ripple adds new insights to a pervasive policymaking dilemma addressed in this Note: is the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) regulatory …

Navigating The Intersection Of Regulation And Vulnerability: The Evolving Landscape Of Cybersecurity In Investment Management And The Imperative For Comprehensive Safeguards, Giezi Rios

Catholic University Journal of Law and Technology

No abstract provided.

Another Major Question: The Department Of Labor Should Retire The Tiebreaker Rule And Reemploy Pecuniary Language In Erisa, Brandon Chesner

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

The Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”) soon turns 50. Instead of celebrating with cake, retirees and future retirees alike get to witness a new chapter in the debate over the consideration of Environmental, Social, or Governance (“ESG”) factors in investing with plan assets. As employees cross the bridge into retirement, they look to their 401(k)s and pension plans for peace of mind, for it is ERISA that has been working silently in the background establishing minimum standards, practices, and fiduciary duties to protect participants. In recent years, the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) has passed three regulations—two …

The Sec, The Supreme Court, And The Administrative State, Paul G. Mahoney

Seattle University Law Review

Pritchard and Thompson have given those of us who study the SEC and the securities laws much food for thought. Their methodological focus is on the internal dynamics of the Court’s deliberations, on which they have done detailed and valuable work. The Court did not, however, operate in a vacuum. Intellectual trends in economics and law over the past century can also help us understand the SEC’s fortunes in the federal courts and make predictions about its future.

Climate, Clarity, Controversy: A Constitutional, Statutory, And Policy Analysis Of The Sec’S Proposed Climate Disclosure Rules, Astoneia O. Moss

Emory Business Law Review

The burgeoning ESG movement has heightened investors’ interest in how companies steward the environment in which they operate; manage their human capital; and implement strategies to effectively manage and fulfill the desires of stakeholders. As a result, the SEC has sought to implement a mandatory climate-related disclosure regime to provide investors with public companies’ climate-related data to assist in the investment decision-making process. The proposed climate-related disclosure rule has faced criticism from businesses, politicians, and legal scholars on constitutional, statutory, and policy grounds. This Comment concludes that based on the statutory language of the Securities Act of 1933 and Securities …

U.S. Securities And Exchange Commission And The "Deep Administrative State": A Case Study Of Its Esg Rules, Jerry W. Markham

American University Business Law Review

This study examines the highly controversial “environmental, social, and governance” (ESG) rules that were adopted by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in 2024. Those rules require large public companies to disclose their policies for dealing with climate change and report their greenhouse gas emissions. Critics charge that those rules are the product of a “deep state” administrative agency that is operating outside the checks and balances imposed by the Constitution on other government actors. The study relates the background for these deep state concerns and the constitutional and statutory restraints that were intended to prevent the development of such …

Corporate Purpose Beyond Borders: A Key To Saving Our Planet Or Colonialism Repackaged?, Roza Nurgozhayeva, Dan W. Puchniak

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The “corporate purpose” debate, while extremely important, has largely been built on an understanding of corporate law and governance that is local – jurisdiction bound – while the issue of climate change is global; pollution does not respect jurisdictional borders. Despite this, in practice, states, multinational corporations, and transnational organizations are increasingly using formal and informal mechanisms to shape sustainable corporate governance beyond jurisdictional borders – a colossal development that has been hiding in plain sight.This article develops a taxonomy for identifying and analyzing the forces driving corporate purpose beyond borders: state-based, firm-based, and organization-based “global corporate law and governance”. …

What’S Scope 3 Good For?, Madison Condon

Faculty Scholarship

Opposition to the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (“SEC”) new rule on updated climate risk reporting has focused on one category of disclosures as particularly objectionable: Scope 3 emissions.⁷ Otherwise known as “supply chain emissions,” Scope 3 emissions have been voluntarily reported by a growing number of companies since the term was invented as part of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol in 2001.⁸ They include all the emissions both up and downstream of a corporations’ own activities: the emissions of the privately-owned factory that produced the shoes Target sells, as well as the emissions you burn while driving to the …

Safe Harbors In The Shadows: Extending 10b5-1 Plans To Cover Shadow Trading, Karen E. Woody, M. Cole Davidson

Scholarly Articles

Insider trading, or trading while in possession of material nonpublic information, remains the legal conundrum it has been for over four decades. The governing rule prohibiting insider trading is Rule 10b-5, passed in 1943 by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in order to clarify Section 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act. Notably, neither Rule 10b-5 and Section 10(b) mention the term “insider trading.” In fact, scholars and historians have opined that insider trading was not considered by Congress as one of the aims of Section 10(b) or Rule 10b-5. Without any statutory guidance regarding insider trading, the legal contours …

Stakeholderism Silo Busting, Aneil Kovvali

Articles by Maurer Faculty

The fields of antitrust, bankruptcy, corporate, and securities law are undergoing tumultuous debates. On one side in each field is the dominant view that each field should focus exclusively on a specific constituency—antitrust on consumers, bankruptcy on creditors, corporate law on shareholders, and securities regulation on financial investors. On the other side is a growing insurgency that seeks to broaden the focus to a larger set of stakeholders, including workers, the environment, and political communities. But these conversations have largely proceeded in parallel, with each debate unfolding within the framework and literature of a single field. Studying these debates together …

Saving Climate Disclosure, Scott Hirst

Faculty Scholarship

Designing a regulatory response to climate change is one of the defining challenges of our era. In an attempt to address it, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has recently proposed a historic rule requiring climate-related disclosure by companies, resting squarely on the rationale of "investor demand." The proposed climate disclosure rule has met with an unprecedented response, some of it reflective of investor demand, but also including a broad array of opponents critical of the rule, who cast doubt on the rule's validity. A judicial challenge is all but inevitable.

This Article explains that the best way for the …

The Sec's Compensation Clawback Loophole, David I. Walker

Faculty Scholarship

The SEC has recently released final rules implementing the executive incentive compensation recovery or “clawback” provisions of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act. These rules are aimed at recovering from executives incentive compensation determined to be excessive in light of a subsequent accounting restatement. Unfortunately, the SEC’s rules create a loophole by excluding purely time-vested stock and stock option grants from the reach of the new clawback regime. This aspect of the rulemaking seems inconsistent with the intent of Congress, and the result likely will be to distort executive pay practices in a perverse fashion, shifting compensation back in the direction of …

The Most Important Decision In Federal Securities Law - Texas Gulf Sulphur, Marc I. Steinberg

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

Although decided 55 years ago, the Second Circuit’s decision in Texas Gulf Sulphur may be viewed as the most important case under the U.S. securities laws. The decision addressed several landmark issues, including insider trading, company disclosure obligations, and the concept of materiality. Although a number of its rulings subsequently were rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court, others remain good law today. From a comparative perspective, Texas Gulf Sulphur also is a significant decision. Many of the principles enunciated by the Second Circuit in that decision today have been adopted by developed securities markets outside of the United States.

United We Stand, Divided We Fall: A Survey Of Current Public And Private Initiatives Addressing Board Diversity & A Proposed Sec Diversity Disclosure To Help Increase Board Diversity, Gabrielle Hunter

Emory Business Law Review

No abstract provided.

Financial Innovation And Unforeseen Consequences: Spacs, Sec Lending, And Shorts, Christian A. Johnson

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

Although publicly traded “special purpose acquisition companies” (SPAC) have been trading for decades, the effect of the unique shareholder rights found in SPAC shares should be fully studied and compared with the rights of publicly traded non-SPAC shares. Because of their differences, PAC shares will not necessarily behave in the same way as non-SPAC shares in certain situations. The short selling of SPAC shares offers a useful case study as well as lessons for regulators, investors, and short sellers about the unforeseen and unintended consequences of financial innovation in the other-wise understood corner of securities lending and short selling of …

The Corporate Forum, Sergio Alberto Gramitto Ricci, Christina M. Sautter

Faculty Works

In this response to Professor Jill Fisch’s article "GameStop and the Reemergence of the Retail Investor," we focus on one of the risks associated with the growth of retail investing that Fisch surveys, uncontrolled information sourcing. Drawing on our work on retail investors, we revisit an instrument dear to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, whose potential has not been unleashed so far, the corporate forum. Our response succinctly discusses the main mechanics of the corporate forum, the benefits the corporate forum could provide, and the feasibility hurdles that might undermine the success of corporate forums.

Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (Spacs) And The Sec, Neal Newman, Lawrence J. Trautman

Faculty Scholarship

Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPACs) are simply enterprises that raise money from the public with the intention of purchasing an existing business and becoming publicly traded in the securities markets. If the SPAC is successful in raising money and the acquisition takes place, the target company takes the SPAC’s place on a stock exchange in a transaction that resembles a public offering. Also known as “blank-check” or “reverse merger” companies, this process avoids many of the pitfalls of a traditional initial public offering.

During late 2020 and 2021 an unprecedented surge in the popularity and issuance of Special Purpose Acquisition …

Don't Forget The "G" In Esg: The Sec And Corporate Governance Disclosure, Jennifer O'Hare

Faculty Publications

For years, many shareholders—both institutional and individual investors—have pressured the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) to require public companies to disclose more information about the environmental, social, and governance (“ESG”) risks facing the company. However, the SEC has generally refused calls to require public corporations to disclose, for example, how they are addressing climate change or workforce diversity challenges. With a new president in the White House and a new administration at the SEC, the SEC will soon propose new ESG disclosure rules, requiring more information about the “E” and the “S” in ESG. But the SEC has forgotten the …

The Twenty-First Annual A.A. Sommer, Jr. Lecture On Corporate, Securities & Financial Law At The Fordham Corporate Law Center, Matthew Diller, G. Jeffrey Boujoukos, Ben A. Indek, Allison Herren Lee

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

No abstract provided.

Does Cryptocurrency Staking Fall Under Sec Jurisdiction?, Nicholas E. Gonzalez

Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law

Bitcoin, the first blockchain and cryptocurrency (crypto), launched in 2009 when the Bitcoin network opened to the public. A blockchain is a digital ledger technology where transactions are aggregated and permanently recorded into blocks of information. Maintenance of a blockchain is typically conducted by decentralized managers who own and operate network computers (“Nodes”) and serve the functions normally handled by central intermediaries to validate and confirm transactions. All Nodes follow a blockchain protocol. In Bitcoin’s and most cryptos’ cases, this protocol is known as a Proof- of-Work protocol which requires a large amount of energy consumption. Consequently, Proof-of-Stake protocols (“PoS”) …