Sky Blog
Many corporate law scholars watched in amazement as merger litigation exploded over the past 15 years. In 2005, only 37 percent of mergers involving U.S. public companies and with a transaction size of at least $100 million were challenged in …
The Big Three passive fund managers (BlackRock, State Street, and Vanguard) have roughly quadrupled their collective ownership stake in S&P 500 companies over the past two decades (Hirst and Bebchuk, 2019). This enormous increase in ownership by passively …
The escalating debate over corporate purpose is not confined to developed economies in the West. Rapidly developing economies in nations like India are similarly grappling with how to define and develop a legal framework around corporate purpose. Corporate social responsibility …
Members of the academic community, the business world, and law firms have long been debating shareholder primacy, stakeholder governance, and corporate purpose. In a forthcoming essay, I outline these arguments but suggest that reform of corporate governance should be focused …
As we wrote toward the end of 2020, the risks associated with business and human rights, and ESG more generally, have led a growing number of companies to create human rights/ESG management systems or to integrate human rights/ESG into existing …
Over the course of 2020, market forces drove corporations and institutional investors to make expansive commitments to their purpose and social responsibility. This fueled companies in many regions to publish lengthy reports under the ESG moniker (Environmental, Social and Governance). …
The Delaware Court of Chancery provided its latest guidance on so-called Caremark claims in a New Year’s Eve opinion issued by Vice Chancellor Glasscock in Richardson v. Clark, an action brought derivatively by a stockholder of Moneygram International, Inc. …
On December 21, 2020, the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) confirmed in a published Policy Statement[1] (the Statement) that it will introduce a new Listing Rule (the Rule) requiring premium listed companies to state whether they have made disclosures …
In a recent working paper, we look at what drives shareholder activism around the world and focus specifically on the role of corporate governance reforms.
While shareholder activism has been a force in U.S. capital markets for some time, …
The reach of American law has recently entered familiar territory: listings of international companies on U.S. exchanges. Yet the listings of Chinese companies have in particular prompted a backlash. I want to shed some light on the situation – and …
Investor conferences are an important component of a firm’s investor relations efforts. Conferences provide managers with the opportunity for face-to-face interactions with investors and analysts. Managers can use these interactions to increase firm visibility and shape external perceptions of the …
The future of corporate stewardship – and therefore corporate governance – rests in the hands of a few large institutional investors.[1] Questions of whether these funds have the necessary incentives to pursue stewardship have set off an explosion of …
Why are large private companies often characterized by poor corporate governance? WeWork provides a recent high-profile example. For reasons that now seem implausible, WeWork attracted billions of investment dollars. Perhaps it was the company’s “vision” or the sheer personality of …
A great deal of buzz has been generated by the recent decision from the Southern District of New York in In re: Nine West LBO Securities Litigation, No. 20 MD 2941 (JSR) 2020 WL 7090277 (S.D.N.Y. Dec. 4, 2020), …
CEO outside directorships and their value to companies have been a topic of debate among a wide range of stakeholders, particularly investors, boards, and policy makers. Some argue that CEO outside directorships benefit a CEO’s own firm by opening valuable …
Shareholder lawsuits have long prompted intense debate. Despite increased corporate democracy and shareholder rights, some commentators argue that shareholder litigation is still a shareholder’s best option to bring about changes. Shareholder litigation can impose personal liability on corporate managers and …
In late 2019, somewhat surprisingly, the Business Roundtable issued a brief statement advocating “a fundamental commitment to all of our stakeholders,” thus ending its decades long singular commitment to shareholder value.
The statement triggered an intense global debate about the …
Late in the afternoon of the Friday before Election Day, the Department of Labor finalized a rule that requires pension and retirement plan fiduciaries to consider only financial interests when investing plan funds. On its face, the rule seems anodyne. …
In the United States this past year, growing movements for social, racial and environmental justice, and the impact of an unprecedented health crisis, have coincided with a range of institutions increasing their focus on promoting environmental, social and governance (“ESG”) …
Economist Albert O. Hirschman (1970) classically set out the two alternatives facing dissatisfied members of an organization: They can voice displeasure or exit for greener pastures. Hirschman’s model has long explained the tradeoff facing shareholders of a poorly governed firm: …