Business Organizations Law Commons^™

Theory, Evidence And Policy On Dual-Class Shares: A Country-Specific Response To A Global Debate, Aurelio Gurrea-Martinez

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Dual-class shares have become one of the most controversial issues in today´s capital markets and corporate governance debates around the world. Namely, it is not clear whether companies should be allowed to go public with dual-class shares and, if so, which restrictions (if any) should be imposed. Three primary regulatory models have been adopted to deal with dual-class shares: (i) prohibitions, existing in countries like the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, Colombia, or Argentina; (ii) the permissive model adopted in several jurisdictions, including Canada, Sweden, the Netherlands, and particularly the United States; and (iii) the restrictive approach recently implemented in Hong …

The Case Against The Implementation Of Loyalty Shares In Spain, Aurelio Gurrea-Martinez

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The Spanish Ministry of Economy has recently released a new bill that, among other aspects, proposes an amendment of the Spanish Companies Act to allow listed companies to adopt loyalty shares. These shares will confer additional voting rights to those shareholders staying in the corporation for at least two years. For that purpose, the company only needs to approve the adoption of loyalty shares by a qualified majority. Therefore, following the Italian (rather than the French) model of loyalty shares, the adoption of loyalty shares in Spain will be done as an opt-in rule.

The King Of The Casl: Canada’S Anti-Spam Law Invades The United States, Arthur Shaykevich

Brooklyn Law Review

U.S. businesses periodically adjust their marketing practices to foreign law innovations. Several years ago, U.S. businesses emailing into Canada had to incorporate Canada’s Anti-Spam Law, otherwise known as CASL. Businesses that believed they email only U.S.-based customers likely dismissed CASL as not applicable. Others may never have heard of the law altogether. As this note discusses, CASL created a compliance conundrum for U.S. businesses. Since CASL methodically differs from the U.S. anti-spam law, CAN-SPAM, it may be in a business’s best interest to apply this law to its Canadian subset and not to the entire email population. Neither the law …

Effective Corporate Compliance: A Holistic Approach For The Sec And The Doj, Serena Hamann

Washington Law Review

Today, most global corporations claim to have effective compliance programs that ensure and monitor their compliance with all state, federal, and even international requirements. A growing body of literature and regulatory activity indicates that truly effective compliance programs must incorporate all of the “Seven Elements of an Effective Compliance Program” contained in the Federal Sentencing Guidelines. Despite these Guidelines and growing industry and regulatory interest in effective compliance, noncompliance continues, and many companies run into trouble when noncompliance brings their actions to the attention of the SEC and the DOJ. In turn, the SEC and the DOJ struggle to encourage …

De Facto Shareholder Primacy, Jeff Schwartz

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

For generations, scholars have debated the purpose of corporations. Should they maximize shareholder value or balance shareholder interests against the corporation’s broader social and economic impact? A longstanding and fundamental premise of this debate is that, ultimately, it is up to corporations to decide. But this understanding is obsolete. Securities law robs corporations of this choice. Once corporations go public, the securities laws effectively require that they maximize share price at the expense of all other goals. This Article is the first to identify the profound impact that the securities laws have on the purpose of public firms — a …

Human Rights Law And The Investment Treaty Regime, Jesse Coleman, Kaitlin Y. Cordes, Lise Johnson

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

In its current form, the international investment treaty regime may stymie the business and human rights agenda in various ways. The regime may incentivize governments to favour the protection of investors over the protection of human rights. Investment treaty standards enforced through investor-state arbitration risk adversely affecting access to justice for project-affected rights holders. More broadly, the regime contributes to a system of global economic governance that elevates and rewards investors’ actions and expectations, irrespective of whether they have adhered to their responsibilities to respect human rights. Without comprehensive reform, investment treaties and investor-state arbitration will continue to interfere with …

Propuesta Para La Mejora Y Modernización De La Legislación Societaria En Ecuador [Proposal For The Improvement And Modernization Of Corporate Law In Ecuador] In Spanish, Aurelio Gurrea-Martinez, Cesar Coronel Jones

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This paper seeks to provide some policy recommendations for the improvement and modernization of corporate law in Ecuador. These proposals have been based on the international literature and the particular features of Ecuador (that is, a country with many micro and small companies, state-owned enterprises, underdeveloped capital markets, unsophisticated courts, among other aspects). Secondly, since the legal, economic and institutional features of Ecuador can be found in other Latin American countries, this paper also seeks to be helpful to other countries in the region planning to reform their corporate laws. Finally, this paper seeks to contribute to the improvement and …

Collaboration Theory And Corporate Tax Avoidance, Eric C. Chaffee

Washington and Lee Law Review

This Article argues that aggressive corporate tax avoidance is legally impermissible based upon the essential nature of the corporate form. The history of the debate over the essential nature of the corporation is substantial. This debate has been reinvigorated by the Supreme Court’s recent opinions, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., which explore the scope of corporate rights.

Innovation Agents, Mirit Eyal-Cohen

Washington and Lee Law Review

The standard narrative of entrepreneurship is one of self-employed creative individuals working out of their garage or independently owned start-up companies. Intrapreneurship— where employees are responsible for being alert to new opportunities inside firms—is another model for developing innovations. Relatively little is known, however, about the latter process through which large, complex firms engage in groundbreaking corporate entrepreneurship.

This Article’s focus is on these types of innovation agents. It provides a thorough account of the positive and negative spillovers of intrapreneurial firms while making the following key points: First, intrapreneurial companies utilize their economies of scale, scope, and age to …

Guarantor Of Last Resort: Is There A Better Alternative?, Morgan Ricks

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

What should the government’s financial-crisis-response toolkit consist of? How should we think about its optimal scope and design? In Kate Judge offers a novel perspective on these questions. At a high level she agrees with Summers, Bernanke, Paulson, and Geithner that the existing toolkit is inadequate. In this respect she joins a number of other legal scholars and commentators. . .

The day after Lehman’s bankruptcy, Ken Rogoff—among the world’s leading experts on financial crises—wrote an op-ed titled “No More Creampuffs.” He applauded regulators for letting Lehman fail and “forc[ing] some discipline onto the system.” (To be fair, Rogoff acknowledged …

In Whose Interests Should A Company Be Run? Fiduciary Duties Of Directors During Corporate Failure In India: Looking To The West For Answers, Gautam Sundaresh

Michigan Business & Entrepreneurial Law Review

This Comment looks at the debate as it has played out in the legal jurisprudence of the U.S. and the U.K. The analysis of each considers the three financial stages of a corporation’s existence that are specifically addressed in the debate today, i.e.: (i) solvency; (ii) insolvency; and (iii) the zone of insolvency. After setting out the current position, this Comment specifically addresses the various shortcomings and criticisms of the models adopted by each jurisdiction and offers observations on the status quo and the implementation of these models. On this basis, this Comment goes on to propose a model to …

Unintentional Irony In Landmark Decisions Of The Delaware Supreme Court Regarding Corporate Law, Steven J. Cleveland

Michigan Business & Entrepreneurial Law Review

Three landmark decisions of the Delaware Supreme Court exhibit unintentional irony: Beam v. Stewart, Smith v. Van Gorkom, and Paramount Communications Inc. v. Time Inc. In Beam, the court concluded that, regarding the decision of whether to seek remedy against Martha Stewart, her fellow directors would not have jeopardized their reputations for the minimal gain of continuing their business and personal relationships with her. Ironically, the court failed to acknowledge that Martha Stewart—in trading on material nonpublic information, which gave rise to the corporate claim against her—jeopardized her reputation (ultimately losing hundreds of millions of dollars and her freedom) for …

Should Shareholders Be Rewarded For Loyalty? European Experiments On The Wedge Between Tenured Voting And Takeover Law, Chiara Mosca

Michigan Business & Entrepreneurial Law Review

Corporate law reveals its democratic background when it comes to the general meetings of shareholders, finding, on both sides of the Atlantic, its most tangible expression in the “one share, one vote” principle. While, in the political landscape, the “one person, one vote” standard is absolute dogma and weighting votes according to people’s preferences and interests has never proved feasible, in the corporate scenario the one share, one vote principle is constantly challenged by the incentives of companies and their shareholders to shape corporate rights according to specific needs. In this respect, some legislators (specifically in France and Italy) have …

Fcpa Enforcement Against U.S. And Non-U.S. Companies, Michael S. Diamant, Christopher W.H. Sullivan, Jason H. Smith

Michigan Business & Entrepreneurial Law Review

This Article explores how U.S. authorities have enforced the FCPA against non-U.S. companies and tests the perception that the FCPA disproportionately impacts U.S. businesses. After briefly discussing the FCPA, its enforcement, and its reach, this Article examines corporate FCPA enforcement activity since the statute’s enactment in 1977. It finds that foreign firms have actually fared worse under the FCPA despite the fact that DOJ and the SEC have brought more enforcement actions against domestic companies in absolute terms. The average cost of resolving an FCPA enforcement action to non-U.S. corporations of resolving an FCPA enforcement action has been more than …

Crafting A Corporate Analogue To Criminal Disenfranchisement, B. Graves Lee Jr.

Michigan Business & Entrepreneurial Law Review

The Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. FEC represented a sea change in the world of corporate citizenship. Although the decision dealt with campaign finance law, it has sparked significant discussion of the concept of corporate personhood more broadly. Corporations have increasingly taken advantage of legal rights previously reserved for individuals. This Note argues that where corporations reap the benefits of constitutional entitlements intended for individuals, they should suffer consequences for malfeasance similar to those imposed on individuals who engage in criminal conduct. Specifically, this Note advocates for limitations on corporate electioneering as a collateral consequence of a …

Promoting Predictability In Business: Solutions For Overlapping Liability In International Anti-Corruption Enforcement, Andrew T. Bulovsky

Michigan Journal of International Law

This Note evaluates solutions to the problems of overlapping liability in general and multi-jurisdictional disgorgement in particular. Part I traces the origins of international anti-corruption efforts and provides an overview of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (the “FCPA”). It then discusses the two most significant international anti-corruption conventions: the OECD’s Convention on Combatting Bribery of Foreign Officials in International Business Transactions (the “OECD Convention”) and the United Nations Convention Against Corruption (“UNCAC”). Part II lays out the problems created by the lack of a formal mechanism to prevent overlapping liability— a phenomenon that violates the common law concept known as …

Toward A Horizontal Fiduciary Duty In Corporate Law, Asaf Eckstein, Gideon Parchomovsky

Cornell Law Review

Fiduciary duty is arguably the single most important aspect of our corporate law system. It consists of two distinct subduties-a duty of care and a duty of loyalty-and it applies to all directors and corporate officers. Yet, under extant law, the duty only applies vertically, in the relationship between directors and corporate officers and the firm. At present, there exists no horizontal fiduciary duty: directors and corporate officers owe no fiduciary duty to each other. Consequently, if one of them falls her peers, they cannot seek direct legal recourse against her even when they stand to suffer significant reputational and …

Investing In A Qualified Opportunity Fund: A Viable Alternative To A Section 1031 Drop-Swap Cash-Out, Bradley T. Borden

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Activist Shareholders At De Facto Controlled Companies, Gaia Balp

Brooklyn Journal of Corporate, Financial & Commercial Law

Activist campaigns are likely to increasingly target controlled companies. Studies concerning activism at controlled companies focus on shareholder-empowering tools, such as the right to nominate and elect minority directors on the board, as a pathway for limiting the principal-principal agency problem. However, not enough attention has been paid to the distinction between de jure and de facto controlled companies. Building on a recent case concerning a leading Italian corporation, this Article analyzes the possible unexpected corporate governance consequences of successful activist intervention at de facto controlled companies, showing that, where minority shareholders are granted the right to appoint directors on …

Sovereign Resilience: Reviving Private-Sector Economic Institutions In Indian Country, Robert J. Miller

BYU Law Review

No abstract provided.