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The collection of all scholarly commentary on law, economics, and more

Showing results for:  “digital markets act”

Rajaratnam’s crime

Rajaratnam stands convicted.  What, exactly, did he do wrong? Holman Jenkins, writing in today’s WSJ, appropriately mocks the notion driving the Rajaratnam prosecution that insider trading “law’s purpose is to protect the public from informed stock prices.” As Jenkins notes: There is no level playing field. Nor does there need to be one for the ... Rajaratnam’s crime

Wal-Mart, Jobs and Consumers

What happens when Wal-Mart comes to town?  One thing is for sure, the line for jobs is long: In contrast, a new Walmart in Cleveland recently received 6000 applicants for 300 positions, and, not long ago, two Walmart stores in the Chicago area received 25,000 and 15,000 applications. The Cleveland store hired one in twenty ... Wal-Mart, Jobs and Consumers

AALS Call for Papers on Behavioral Economics & Antitrust Law

Call for Papers Announcement   AALS Section on Antitrust and Economic Regulation AALS Section on Law & Economics   Behavioral Economics & Antitrust Law   January 5-8, 2012 2012 AALS Annual Meeting Washington, DC   The AALS Section on Antitrust and Economic Regulation and the Section on Law & Economics will hold a joint program ... AALS Call for Papers on Behavioral Economics & Antitrust Law

Barnett v. Barnett on Antitrust

Tom Barnett (Covington & Burling) represents Expedia in, among other things, its efforts to persuade a US antitrust agency to bring a case against Google involving the alleged use of its search engine results to harm competition.  In that role, in a recent piece in Bloomberg, Barnett wrote the following things: “The U.S. Justice Department ... Barnett v. Barnett on Antitrust

Schumer and the decline of New York

Six years ago Henry Butler and I wrote about what we called the Sarbanes-Oxley Debacle. Well, it’s still a debacle after all these years, and having significant effects on business and international competition. Yesterday’s WSJ opined, concerning the potential NYSE/Deutsche Borse merger that  whoever ends up owning the iconic trading venue, the question is whether ... Schumer and the decline of New York

Private equity and financial distress

I’ve written often, particularly in my Rise of the Uncorporation, of the upside disciplinary effect of uncorporate management.  This includes the salutary role of private equity (e.g., this recent post). But detractors argue that private equity-backed leveraged buyouts, by replacing equity with debt, make targets vulnerable to the disruption of bankruptcy.  A recent paper by ... Private equity and financial distress

FTC Microeconomics Conference

The Fourth Annual FTC Microeconomics Conference is scheduled for November 3 and 4, 2011.   Here is the call for papers: The Federal Trade Commission’s Bureau of Economics will host a two day conference to bring together scholars working in areas related to the FTC’s antitrust, consumer protection and public policy missions. Those areas include industrial ... FTC Microeconomics Conference

Say on pay at the SEC?

Reuters reports on Henry Hu’s somewhat controversial tenure heading the SEC’s new Division of Risk, Strategy and Financial Innovation. The SEC brought in Hu, a widely recognized expert on financial regulation, in response to its embarrassing Madoff failure.  The Reuters article discusses some reservations about how much Hu accomplished, but I want to focus on ... Say on pay at the SEC?

Politics and Price Gouging

Commissioner Rosch gets off his second shot in against the Department of Justice in just a few weeks in the pages of the Wall Street Journal — this time in a letter to the editor: Obama’s Political ‘Price-Gouging’ If any doubts existed about whether the Justice Department is just “an arm of the administration,” they ... Politics and Price Gouging

Antitrust as Innovation Policy

The Washington Post links to the transcript of the President’s recent remarks at a Palo Alto town hall meeting at Facebook’s headquarters on April 20.  The President talked about recent issues of interest, focusing primarily on the budget, unemployment and health care.  I did see one item that may be of interest to the antitrust ... Antitrust as Innovation Policy

Jets and LBOs

I have written about the disciplinary effect of the uncorporate form, particularly in LBOs.  See, e.g., here and Chapter 8 of my Rise of the Uncorporation. Now here’s more evidence:  Edgerton, Agency Problems in Public Firms: Evidence from Corporate Jets in Leveraged Buyouts.  Here’s the abstract: This paper uses rich, new data to examine the ... Jets and LBOs

Arbitration, preemption and regulatory coordination

AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, 2011 WL 1561956 (April 27, 2011) could end up being one of the most important pro-business cases of the last several years — even more important than Citizens United. The case involved the application of Section 2 of the Federal Arbitration Act (9 U.S.C. §2), which makes agreements to arbitrate ... Arbitration, preemption and regulatory coordination