Posts from June 2018

OBLB categories

  • Financial Regulation
29 Jun 2018

The Legal Framework for Financial Advertising: Curbing Behavioural Exploitation

Martin Brenncke

My article offers a normative behavioural finance analysis of the marketing communications regime in Europe’s new Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID II). The article aims to bridge the...
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OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
  • M&A
28 Jun 2018

Enforcing the Takeover Panel’s Decisions: Panel v King [2018] CSIH 30

Paul Davies QC (hon), Harris Manchester College

One of the fears that led the UK Government and the Panel on Takeovers and Mergers to oppose initially the European Commission’s proposals for a Takeover Directive – despite the obvious influence of...

OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
27 Jun 2018

The Digital Afterlife

Rebecca Keating

Benjamin Franklin famously said, ‘in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes’. However, when it comes to our digital deaths the old adage is far from true. On 18 June...

OBLB categories

  • Brexit
  • Financial Regulation
26 Jun 2018

The Consequences of Brexit for Financial Market Law

Matthias Lehmann | Dirk A. Zetzsche

Whether London will remain the centre for European financial transactions will depend on its access to the Single Market. Under the current circumstances, nobody can predict either what the legal...
Featured

OBLB categories

  • Corporate Finance
22 Jun 2018

The Crypto Puzzle

One of the central predictions of the law and finance literature is that strong investor protection laws will promote the development of strong markets. This prediction rests on the observation that...

OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
  • Corporate Finance
21 Jun 2018

Valuation Disputes in Corporate Bankruptcy

Kenneth Ayotte | Edward Morrison

In bankruptcy, as in corporate law, valuation drives disputes. Prior bankruptcy scholarship points to disagreements about valuation and judicial valuation error as key drivers of Chapter 11 outcomes...

OBLB categories

  • Financial Regulation
19 Jun 2018

A Functional Analysis of SIFI Insolvency

Stephen J. Lubben

Since the disgrace of Lehman, the question of how to handle failing SIFIs has been quite vexed. On the one hand, governmental rescue of shareholders and other investors is beyond annoying, and there...

OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
  • Corporate Finance
18 Jun 2018

Shareholder Sustainability Activism in the Netherlands

Anne Lafarre | Christoph Van der Elst

The present and the future generations depend on a sustainable society. Companies have a large impact on our society and play a large role in achieving sustainability goals. In this context, the role...

OBLB categories

  • Corporate Governance
14 Jun 2018

Recommendations to improve Hong Kong’s corporate governance system

Syren Johnstone | Say H Goo

The ‘Report on Improving Corporate Governance in Hong Kong’, published by the Hong Kong Institute of Certified Public Accountants on 2 May 2018, assesses the strengths and weaknesses of Hong Kong’s...

OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
  • Financial Regulation
13 Jun 2018

Secured Transactions Law in the Twenty-First Century

Charles W. Mooney, Jr. | Steven L. Schwarcz | Giuliano G. Castellano

Security interests are the building blocks of modern, credit-based economies, and a key component in the quest to promote economic development and sustainable growth. They provide lenders with rights...

OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
  • Corporate Governance
12 Jun 2018

Being Held to One’s Given Word: The Binding Force of Self-Regulation

Patrick Leyens

Around 200 years ago Sir William Blackstone, the great commentator of English common law, used the metaphor of a shingle to describe the effects of self-commitments. Professionals who place a shingle...

OBLB categories

  • Financial Regulation
12 Jun 2018

Repo markets across the Atlantic: similar but unalike

Songjiwen Wu | Hossein Nabilou

The vulnerabilities in the wholesale funding and in particular short-term (overnight) repurchase agreement (repo) markets were significant sources of systemic risk in the Global Financial Crisis (GFC...
Featured

OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
  • Financial Regulation
11 Jun 2018

ICYMI - ‘New Frontiers: Technology, Finance and Regulation’ (5th Annual Conference of the Journal of Financial Regulation)

OBLB Editors

From distributed ledgers and smart contracts, to data mining, algorithmic trading, and robo-advisors - new technologies are rapidly changing the face of the financial services industry. These...

OBLB categories

  • Corporate Finance
  • Corporate Governance
  • Financial Regulation
11 Jun 2018

Towards a Credible System of Independent Directors in Latin American Listed Companies

Oliver Orton | Aurelio Gurrea Martínez

As shown by the law and finance literature, most Latin American companies have concentrated ownership structures with controlling shareholders (La Porta et al, 1998, 1999). As a result, the primary...

OBLB categories

  • Corporate Governance
08 Jun 2018

How firm reputation shapes managerial discretion

Owen Parker | Ryan Krause | Cynthia Devers

The modern marketplace is saturated with ‘ratings’ and ‘reviews’ of a firm’s products, services, and financial performance on platforms such as Google, Yelp, Bloomberg, and Facebook. While we know a...
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OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
07 Jun 2018

Digital Personhood? The Status of Autonomous Software Agents in Private Law

Gunther Teubner

Autonomous software agents already today are attributed social identity and the ability to act under certain conditions. Due to action attribution in economic and social contexts, they have become...

OBLB categories

  • Corporate Finance
  • Financial Regulation
06 Jun 2018

Rule 701 Enhanced Disclosure Threshold to Increase

Shearman & Sterling

On May 24, 2018, President Trump signed into law the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act (Reform Act), which, among other things, amended securities law provisions focused...

OBLB categories

  • Corporate Governance
05 Jun 2018

Revision of the UK Corporate Governance Code: Some Observations from Continental Europe

Hélène Vletter-van Dort | Titiaan Keijzer

According to the classic Cadbury definition, ‘corporate governance is the system by which companies are directed and controlled’. On 5 December 2017, the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) published a...

OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
01 Jun 2018

Law and Autonomous Systems Series: How to Resolve Smart Contract Disputes - Smart Arbitration as a Solution

Mateja Durovic

Recent developments in 'smart' digital technologies, in particular blockchain technology, are changing and challenging the framework in which business is conducted. A prominent feature of the...

OBLB categories

  • Commercial Law
01 Jun 2018

Bailouts, the legal status of Memoranda of Understanding, and the scope of application of the EU Charter: Florescu

Menelaos Markakis | Paul Dermine

It is a measure of the complexity of Economic and Monetary Union law that almost 10 years since the onset of the Euro crisis we do not yet have an answer to some of the most fundamental legal...