Oxford Business Law Blog

Firms with strong corporate governance are often likened to democracies. Through their proposals and votes, shareholders can determine the broad direction of a company. However, shareholder...

Both practitioners and academics generally have a dim view of dual-class share structures. For example, when Snap Inc. was preparing for its initial public offering (IPO) in 2017, CalPERS and other...

A keynote policy of UK financial regulation since the financial crisis has been the ‘ring-fencing’ of retail banks into separate and independently operated entities, so-called ‘ring-fenced bodies’ (...

In our paper ‘Director Bankruptcy Experience and Corporate Risk Taking’, we evaluate the extent to which a director’s corporate bankruptcy experience affects the policies their firms follow. We begin...

Cross-border venture capital investments play an important role in the scaling up of high-growth companies. However, when these companies obtain foreign funding, typically from US investors, there is...

A central issue in corporate governance literature is the extent to which ‘good’ governance practices are universal (one size mostly fits all) or instead depend on country and firm characteristics,...

2018 witnessed an eruption of auditing scandals around the globe, but the political reaction has been uniquely intense in the U.K. The Labour Party has promised to ‘break up’ the Big Four, and the...

The market for investing in distressed debt securities, the so-called ‘vulture’ markets, has captured the interest of increasing numbers of investors and analysts. These investors, sometimes...

One of the key recommended principles of the American Bankruptcy Institute’s (ABI) proposed reform of the US bankruptcy procedure is to grant a redemption option to junior creditors. This option...

Complex capital structures are prevalent in many recent high-profile Chapter 11 bankruptcy cases. One recent example is Toys ‘R’ Us, whose debt structure was, as characterized by Bloomberg...

In 2005, the perception that wealthy executives were being rewarded for failure led Congress to ban Chapter 11 debtors from paying ‘retention’ bonuses to senior managers. Prior to the reform,...

In the last few years, an ever-increasing number of platforms are launching ICOs (initial coin offerings). But what happens if an insolvent debtor holds tokens and insolvency proceedings are opened?...

My new paper, Secured Credit and Effective Entity Priority addresses a puzzle in bankruptcy and secured transactions law regarding the scope of security interests. Under existing law, security...

Recent studies have purported to show that the wave of board destaggering that has occurred over the past fifteen years has resulted in value destruction amounting to roughly $350 billion or 6.5% of...

The breach of Union law procedure of the European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) has been in the spotlight recently. In July, the European Banking Authority (EBA) issued a recommendation under the...

The obligation on issuers to disclose inside information 'as soon as possible' is one of the cornerstones of EU securities market regulation. In my paper I explore the EU’s approach to regulating...

In our paper, ‘Creditor Governance’, we investigate the degree to which large creditors exert influence over borrower investment decisions, and whether creditor-influenced changes in firm policies...

‘Equity crowdfunding’—small Internet-based public securities offerings exempt from the usual regulations for such transactions—is an exciting new source for entrepreneurial finance, and New Zealand...

Why are security interests and legal entities both widely used? The prevailing answer in legal scholarship is that both bodies of law exist to partition assets for the benefit of designated creditors...

It is now twenty years since the publication of La Porta et al’s “Law and Finance” paper in the Journal of Political Economy. Although the methodology used in early law and finance papers attracted...

There is a growing sense among academics and practitioners that common ownership—where two firms are at least partially owned by the same investor—is on the rise among publicly-held U.S. firms and...