Sky Blog
The following comes to us from Bernard S. Sharfman, Visiting Assistant Professor of Law at Case Western Reserve University School of Law.
In this era of shareholder activism, there are still many attorneys and academics who believe that the traditional …
The following is based on a memo from Davis Polk, published on October 7, 2013, which is available here. The original memo contains many useful tables and definitions which have been omitted from this post.
On September 18, 2013, …
On September 18, 2013, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) adopted its final rule on the permanent registration of municipal advisors (the “Final Rule”). The Final Rule replaces the current temporary registration scheme for municipal advisors
Last week, the Delaware Court of Chancery ruled that an acquiring merger party obtains legal control of all of a target’s attorney-client communications, absent an express provision in a merger agreement to the contrary. Great Hill Equity Partners IV, LP …
The following comes to us from the Honorable Judge Jed S. Rakoff, who sits in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Judge Rakoff is also an adjunct professor at Columbia Law School and will be …
The following comes to us from Felix Zhiyu Feng, a PhD candidate from the department of economics at Duke University
The lucrative compensation of Wall Street bankers and executives has always been an issue of media interest and public concern. …
Are corporations “persons” with constitutional rights? The Supreme Court has famously avoided addressing the issue head on. In Citizens United, which like no other decision in recent memory elevated the importance of the question whether organizations can assert constitutional rights,…
Over the last two years, there has been significant media coverage of Securities and Exchange Commission settlements that contain no admissions of wrongdoing—sometimes referred to as “Neither Admit, Nor Deny” agreements—and the lack of criminal charges for the 2008 financial …
On September 30, the staff of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (the “SEC”) Division of Trading and Markets addressed an issue of great interest to the compliance and legal community concerning the circumstances under which the compliance and legal staffs
The recent increase in the frequency and success with which “willful blindness” theories have been asserted in litigation may have long term implications for the corporate director’s liability profile.
Willful blindness is an aggressive liability theory that seeks to expand …
Mary Jo White promised Congress she would pursue a “bold and unrelenting” enforcement program as Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”). In public remarks last week, White reiterated her desire for the Enforcement Division “to be everywhere” and …
In my article, The Pension System and the Rise of Shareholder Primacy, which has recently appeared in the Seton Hall Law Review, I explore the influence of the pension system on corporate governance, particularly shareholder primacy and the relationship …
On August 28, 2013, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Federal Reserve Board), the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission …
Harvard Law School Professor Lucian Bebchuk believes that shareholders should be able to control the material decisions of the companies they invest in. Over the years, he has written numerous articles expressing this view, including a 2005 article urging that …
The following comes to us from Michael Rivera, a partner at Venable LLP in Washington, D.C.
Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Mary Jo White warned that the SEC will pull no punches under the leadership of the former federal prosecutor. …
Commissioner Kara M. Stein gave the following statement on September 18, 2013 at an SEC open meeting in Washington D.C. The new municipal advisor registration rules are available here.
Municipalities are the lifeblood of many communities. They provide the …
James Matarese and Danielle Lauzon are M&A partners at Goodwin Procter LLP whose practices focus on technology and life sciences companies. Their recent representations include Onyx Pharmaceuticals in its merger with Amgen in a transaction valued at $10.4 billion.
On …
Chapter 11 creates a system of collective corporate governance that allows stakeholders that are usually passive – such as shareholders or creditors like lenders and bondholders – to play a day-to-day role in overseeing management and monitoring the business. In …