Sky Blog
On Monday, December 16th, Morrison Foerster released what may be a first-of-its-kind regulatory reform glossary. The glossary, which is not comprehensive, is intended to serve as a helpful summary of neologisms and other acronyms (e.g., SIFI), nicknames (e.g., repo), and …
Hedge funds’ distressed and default debt investments in the United States have increased dramatically in the last two decades (from around $70 billion in 1998 to around $867 billion in 2007) and hedge funds with strategies that focus on distressed …
In the late 1980s, large financial institutions successfully marketed a new exemption in the tax code authorizing the perpetual insulation of wealth from federal transfer taxes. Specifically, the 1986 tax code reforms included an exemption from the federal Generation Skipping …
Boards of public corporations have more independent directors than ever before. Sixty percent of boards of S&P 500 companies are not only majority independent, but have a single insider on the board: the CEO. While Jamie Dimon is still CEO …
The following is based on a memo from Debevoise & Plimpton, published on November 1, 2013, which is available here. The original memo contains a useful graphic representation of the LCR equation which has been omitted from this post.
Almost everyone has an opinion about securities enforcement. Many are disappointed (and even angry) that “few high level executives” have been prosecuted (criminally or even civilly) in connection with the 2008 financial crisis.[1] Deep in their bunker, the SEC …
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 post is based on a memo originally published by Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom LLP & Affiliates on October 24, 2013.
The Federal Reserve Board (Board) today approved a proposed rule requiring larger U.S. banking organizations maintain …
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. …
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 …
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 Office of Financial Research (“OFR”), an office of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, recently issued a report that may provide a roadmap for future designations by the Financial Stability Oversight Council (“FSOC”) of asset management companies for supervision …
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 …