Did Ellison buy HP information?
Some are saying that Larry Ellison is putting his money where his mouth is. He loudly defended Mark Hurd after his firing by HP, and now he’s hired the guy. Here’s the WSJ story. Maybe there’s more to this. HP and Oracle are competing over database products, and are making acquisitions in similar areas, such ... Did Ellison buy HP information?
Government by youth gangs
Aristides N. Hatzis (University of Athens) has a fairly new blog, and it has an interesting post by Russell S. Sobel on Sobel’s and Brian Osaba’s article Youth Gangs as Pseudo-Governments. Here’s the abstract: We hypothesize the failure of government to protect the rights of individuals from violence committed by youths has led to the ... Government by youth gangs
We’re number 9
On Wikio’s Top 20 legal blogs. Thanks to our readers and keep coming back.
Judicial dissolution of LLCs and the operating agreement
The ever helpful Francis Pileggi brings us news of the Delaware Chancery Court’s recent decision in Lola Cars International Ltd. v. Krohn Racing, LLC, which refused after trial to dissolve an LLC under Delaware §18-802. As I discussed last December, the court previously denied a motion to dismiss the dissolution complaint. I then noted that ... Judicial dissolution of LLCs and the operating agreement
Owning the law
Just as my Death of Big Law has been published, I’m working with Bruce Kobayashi on a new paper with the above working title, which I will be presenting at the Canadian Law & Economics conference in October. Here’s a taste of an early version I presented last May at Law & Society. Now the ... Owning the law
The SEC vs. shareholders
One of the great myths about the SEC’s new proxy access rule is that it is pro-shareholder, or at least gives new clout to shareholders. This is simply wrong, since the SEC evidently did not intend to help shareholders, or at least anything like a significant fraction of the universe of shareholders, and almost certainly ... The SEC vs. shareholders
Proxy access arrives. Now what?
Here’s the SEC’s release, its summary and another one by Lisa Fairfax. As I’ve said, “peek behind the “shareholder democracy” rhetoric and we see * * * federal control of corporate law [and] turning corporate governance into a political battle between unions and managers.” As for the federal takeover, the SEC’s adopting release says We ... Proxy access arrives. Now what?
The troubles with business journalists
Chrystia Freeland had some interesting thoughts on this in Sunday’s New York Times: Too much of the top business writing (e.g., Michael Lewis) reports from the inside, based on cooperation with the insiders. Mikael Blomkvist would disapprove. So-called investigative reporters like Gretchen Morgenson obsess over individual wrongdoing instead of root causes. (Don’t get me started.) ... The troubles with business journalists
The regulatory origins of the flash crash
On May 6, 2010, the market suddenly swung a thousand points. Nobody really knows why. But Dennis Berman, in the WSJ, has a clue – maybe the regulators did it. He notes that today’s market results from 1975 market reforms aimed at eliminating market makers who were increasing trading costs by increasing spreads: [B]y the ... The regulatory origins of the flash crash
Criminalizing fiduciary breach
I have posted my Senate testimony from last spring (“Fiduciary Duties of Investment Bankers: Senate Testimony – May 4, 2010”). There I comment on Arlen Specter’s subcommittee’s attempt to use the furor aroused by the SEC’s strike suit against Goldman to make some terrible new law. The subcommittee wanted to go beyond merely imposing new ... Criminalizing fiduciary breach
Mutual fund advisers’ fiduciary duties
As I discussed a couple of days ago in my post about the SEC’s moves toward imposing fiduciary duties on brokers, I have a new paper on how Congress and the courts messed up fiduciary duties in another context: Federal Misgovernance of Mutual Funds. The paper is about a Supreme Court case decided last term. ... Mutual fund advisers’ fiduciary duties
The future of the Company and the Uncorporation
The Economist has some important recognition of the uncorporation, written by its Schumpeter columnist, who is Adrian Wooldridge. Wooldridge co-wrote with John Micklethwait an important little book called The Company. The article begins, in the spirit of Wooldridge’s book, by noting that “for most of the past 150 years public companies have swept all before ... The future of the Company and the Uncorporation
