Limiting Litigation Through Corporate Governance Documents

Limiting Litigation Through Corporate Governance Documents PDF Author: Ann Lipton
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 22

Get Book Here

Book Description
There has recently been a surge of interest in “privately ordered” solutions to the problem of frivolous stockholder litigation, in the form of corporate bylaw and charter provisions that place new limitations on plaintiffs' ability to bring claims. The most popular type of provision has been the forum selection clause; other provisions that have been imposed include arbitration requirements, fee-shifting to require that losing plaintiffs pay defendants' attorneys' fees, and minimum stake requirements. Proponents argue that these provisions favor shareholders by sparing the corporation the expense of defending against meritless litigation. Drawing on the metaphor of corporation as contract, they argue that litigation limits are often enforced in ordinary commercial contracts, and that bylaws and charter provisions should be interpreted similarly. In this chapter, I recount the history of these provisions and the state of the law regarding their enforceability. I then discuss some of the doctrinal and policy questions that have been raised regarding different types of litigation limits, and the propriety of private ordering in this context. In particular, I explore how corporate managers' structural and informational advantages may make litigation limits easy to abuse; moreover, litigation itself serves public purposes that may be more appropriately subject to public control.Please note: This is a draft chapter. The final version is available in Research Handbook on Representative Shareholder Litigation edited by Sean Griffith, Jessica Erickson, David Webber, and Verity Winship, published in 2018, Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd, https://www.elgaronline.com/view/edcoll/9781786435330/9781786435330.00020.xml.

Limiting Litigation Through Corporate Governance Documents

Limiting Litigation Through Corporate Governance Documents PDF Author: Ann Lipton
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 22

Get Book Here

Book Description
There has recently been a surge of interest in “privately ordered” solutions to the problem of frivolous stockholder litigation, in the form of corporate bylaw and charter provisions that place new limitations on plaintiffs' ability to bring claims. The most popular type of provision has been the forum selection clause; other provisions that have been imposed include arbitration requirements, fee-shifting to require that losing plaintiffs pay defendants' attorneys' fees, and minimum stake requirements. Proponents argue that these provisions favor shareholders by sparing the corporation the expense of defending against meritless litigation. Drawing on the metaphor of corporation as contract, they argue that litigation limits are often enforced in ordinary commercial contracts, and that bylaws and charter provisions should be interpreted similarly. In this chapter, I recount the history of these provisions and the state of the law regarding their enforceability. I then discuss some of the doctrinal and policy questions that have been raised regarding different types of litigation limits, and the propriety of private ordering in this context. In particular, I explore how corporate managers' structural and informational advantages may make litigation limits easy to abuse; moreover, litigation itself serves public purposes that may be more appropriately subject to public control.Please note: This is a draft chapter. The final version is available in Research Handbook on Representative Shareholder Litigation edited by Sean Griffith, Jessica Erickson, David Webber, and Verity Winship, published in 2018, Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd, https://www.elgaronline.com/view/edcoll/9781786435330/9781786435330.00020.xml.

Corporate Governance

Corporate Governance PDF Author: Walter Effross
Publisher: Aspen Publishing
ISBN: 1543825850
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 1144

Get Book Here

Book Description
Buy a new version of this textbook and receive access to the Connected eBook on CasebookConnect, including: lifetime access to the online ebook with highlight, annotation, and search capabilities, plus an outline tool and other helpful resources. Connected eBooks provide what you need most to be successful in your law school classes. Corporate Governance examines in an extraordinarily practical and accessible way the legal concerns of today’s shareholders, stakeholders, directors, officers, and their counsel, with a special emphasis on drafting documents and developing procedures to anticipate and prevent problems. Designed for real-world application by students, practitioners, executives, investors, and activists, the text includes excerpts from only the most important judicial decisions. Extensive notes and analyses provide context from courts, commentators, institutional investors, proxy advisors, stock exchange requirements, and businesspeople. Dozens of examples “ripped from the headlines,” or taken from corporate documents, the “Great Books,” or pop culture illustrate and illuminate key principles. Appendices offer detailed information to establish, support, and advance the reader’s career in corporate governance practice. New to the Third Edition: Composite provisions, offset in text boxes, patterned on the corporate governance guidelines of major corporations, identify the issues in and approaches to drafting such documents. New appendices discussing: On Preparing and Presenting “Actionable” Advice, for both executives and their counsel (Appendix B), and Ten Tips for Transparency in Posting Core Corporate Documents Online (Appendix C); and a fully updated list of Recommended Resources for Corporate Governance Research (Appendix A). In Chapter 1, enhanced discussion and examples of themes and trends in the study, theory, and practice of corporate governance. Throughout Chapter 2, expanded treatment of the directors’ responsibility to monitor and reduce risks (including special issues of cybersecurity); and analyses of the rules of conduct for board meetings, of variable/differential voting powers of directors; and of emergency bylaws. In Chapter 3, new discussions of meetings in “executive session,” and of the viability of a policy against a company’s directors’ dating each other; and additional material on: constraints on executives’ “private” activities and statements; special responsibilities of members of the audit committee; and the composition and role of the executive committee. In Chapter 4, updated discussions of virtual meetings of shareholders, of the rules of conduct for shareholder meetings, and of forum selection provisions for intracorporate litigation; and new sections on “loyalty shares”/“tenure voting,” on fee-shifting provisions, and on mandatory arbitration provisions. In Chapter 5, new examinations of: increased efforts (and mandates) to diversify the composition of boards; the “financial literacy” requirement for (some) directors; enabling the CEO also to serve as the board chair; the role of the “executive chair”; “golden leashes” for directors; the roles and responsibilities of advisory board members, advisory directors, emeritus directors, honorary directors, and board observers; proxy access proposals; and “refreshing” the board through age and term limits for directors. In Chapter 6, expanded discussions of clawbacks, restrictions on executives’ pledging and hedging company stock, Key Employee Retention Plans (KERPs) in bankruptcy situations, “golden hellos,” and “say on pay” litigation; and an analysis of the recent requirement of “pay ratio disclosure.” In Chapter 7, updated material on ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) issues, and on social enterprises such as benefit corporations and Certified B Corporations. In Chapter 8, a new discussion of the role and relationship to corporate counsel, of the chief compliance officer. Professors and students will benefit from: References to more than 200 newly added decisions. Identification of hundreds of intriguing topics for papers and/or blogs. Comparisons and contrasts of the governance practices supported by institutional investors, proxy advisors, and stock exchanges. A practice-ready, drafting-oriented approach to the systems, structures, and strategies of corporate governance.

The New Governance and the Challenge of Litigation Bylaws

The New Governance and the Challenge of Litigation Bylaws PDF Author: Jill E. Fisch
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 45

Get Book Here

Book Description
Corporate governance mechanisms designed to ensure that managers act in shareholders' interest have evolved dramatically over the past forty years. “Old governance” mechanisms such as independent directors and performance-based executive compensation have been supplemented by innovations that give shareholders greater input into both the selection of directors and ongoing operational decisions. Issuer boards have responded with tools to limit the exercise of shareholder power both procedurally and substantively. This article terms the adoption and use of these tools, which generally take the form of structural provisions in the corporate charter or bylaws, the “new governance.”Delaware law has largely taken a hands-off approach to the new governance. The courts have policed shareholder innovations that interfere unduly with board authority and have invalidated board innovations that are extreme or adopted for an inequitable purpose. For the most part, however, the law has deferred to private ordering - leaving individual firms to structure their governance mechanisms as they see fit, with market discipline forming the primary constraint. In 2015, however, the Delaware legislature responded to the growth of bylaws designed to control the extent of shareholder litigation with an unusual step; it amended the statute to impose mandatory limits on litigation bylaw and charter provisions that went beyond the constraints imposed by the Delaware courts and that could not be altered by individual firms. It is difficult to reconcile the legislature's action in light of Delaware's traditional deference to the courts and the market.This article argues that the legislature's response to litigation bylaws is best understood as a mandate that corporations who seek to avail themselves of Delaware law by incorporating within the state submit to the full package of Delaware corporate law - a package that includes both statutory provisions and oversight by the Delaware courts. In that light, the legislation should not be understood as signalling an intention to subject the new governance to greater oversight.

Essays in Corporate Governance

Essays in Corporate Governance PDF Author: Ian Appel
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 334

Get Book Here

Book Description
In the first chapter ("Governance by Litigation") I study the role of shareholder litigation rights in corporate governance. To empirically identify the effects of shareholder lawsuits, I use the staggered adoption of universal demand (UD) laws in 23 states between 1989 and 2005. These laws impose a significant obstacle to lawsuits against directors and officers for breach of fiduciary duty. UD laws are associated with increased use of governance provisions (e.g., classified boards) that entrench managers or otherwise limit shareholder voice. I also document fewer institutional blockholders, changes to financial policies and CEO compensation, and impaired performance for firms subject to UD. Overall, my findings cast doubt on the notion that shareholder lawsuits primarily benefit attorneys rather than corporations or their shareholders.

Research Handbook on Representative Shareholder Litigation

Research Handbook on Representative Shareholder Litigation PDF Author: Sean Griffith
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
ISBN: 1786435349
Category : LAW
Languages : en
Pages : 576

Get Book Here

Book Description
Written by leading scholars and judges in the field, the Research Handbook on Representative Shareholder Litigation is a modern-day survey of the state of shareholder litigation. Its chapters cover securities class actions, merger litigation, derivative suits, and appraisal litigation, as well as other forms of shareholder litigation. Through in-depth analysis of these different forms of litigation, the book explores the agency costs inherent in representative litigation, the challenges of multijurisdictional litigation and disclosure-only settlements, and the rise of institutional investors. It explores how related issues are addressed across the globe, with examinations of shareholder litigation in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the European Union, Israel, and China. This Research Handbook will be an invaluable resource on this important topic for scholars, practitioners, judges and legislators.

The Genius of American Corporate Law

The Genius of American Corporate Law PDF Author: Roberta Romano
Publisher: American Enterprise Institute
ISBN: 9780844738369
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 180

Get Book Here

Book Description
This is a study of the structure of American corporate law, which combines economic analysis with empirical insights to produce a number of policy insights. It is suitable for anyone studying corporate law, securities regulation, comparative company law or federalism.

Law and Reputation

Law and Reputation PDF Author: Roy Shapira
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316946916
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 271

Get Book Here

Book Description
The legal system affects behavior not just directly, by imposing sanctions, but also indirectly, by producing information on how people behave. For example, internal company documents exposed during litigation will help third parties assess whether they trust a company and want to keep doing business with it. The law therefore affects behavior by shaping reputations. Drawing on economics, communications, and a nascent multidisciplinary literature on reputation, Roy Shapira highlights how reputation works, and how information from the courtroom affects the court of public opinion, with a particular emphasis on the role of the media. By fleshing out interactions between law and reputation, Shapira corrects common misperceptions about the ability of market forces to discipline corporate behavior and adds to timely, ongoing debates such as the desirability of heightened pleading standards or mandatory arbitration clauses. Law and Reputation should interest any scholar who invokes notions of market discipline in their work.

The Handbook of the Economics of Corporate Governance

The Handbook of the Economics of Corporate Governance PDF Author: Benjamin Hermalin
Publisher: Elsevier
ISBN: 0444635408
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 762

Get Book Here

Book Description
The Handbook of the Economics of Corporate Governance, Volume One, covers all issues important to economists. It is organized around fundamental principles, whereas multidisciplinary books on corporate governance often concentrate on specific topics. Specific topics include Relevant Theory and Methods, Organizational Economic Models as They Pertain to Governance, Managerial Career Concerns, Assessment & Monitoring, and Signal Jamming, The Institutions and Practice of Governance, The Law and Economics of Governance, Takeovers, Buyouts, and the Market for Control, Executive Compensation, Dominant Shareholders, and more. Providing excellent overviews and summaries of extant research, this book presents advanced students in graduate programs with details and perspectives that other books overlook. Concentrates on underlying principles that change little, even as the empirical literature moves on Helps readers see corporate governance systems as interrelated or even intertwined external (country-level) and internal (firm-level) forces Reviews the methodological tools of the field (theory and empirical), the most relevant models, and the field’s substantive findings, all of which help point the way forward

Corporate Governance in the Common-Law World

Corporate Governance in the Common-Law World PDF Author: Christopher M. Bruner
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107354900
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 317

Get Book Here

Book Description
The corporate governance systems of Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States are often characterized as a single 'Anglo-American' system prioritizing shareholders' interests over those of other corporate stakeholders. Such generalizations, however, obscure substantial differences across the common-law world. Contrary to popular belief, shareholders in the United Kingdom and jurisdictions following its lead are far more powerful and central to the aims of the corporation than are shareholders in the United States. This book presents a new comparative theory to explain this divergence and explores the theory's ramifications for law and public policy. Bruner argues that regulatory structures affecting other stakeholders' interests - notably differing degrees of social welfare protection for employees - have decisively impacted the degree of political opposition to shareholder-centric policies across the common-law world. These dynamics remain powerful forces today, and understanding them will be vital as post-crisis reforms continue to take shape.

Corporate Governance: Principles, Policies and Practices: Principles, Polices and Practices

Corporate Governance: Principles, Policies and Practices: Principles, Polices and Practices PDF Author: A. C. Fernando
Publisher: Pearson Education India
ISBN: 8131795543
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 787

Get Book Here

Book Description
The second edition of A. C. Fernando's bestselling Corporate Governance: Principles, Policies and Practices sheds light on recent corporate problems using a flexible modular format, through a detailed explanation of the corporate governance mechanism and the various incentives within today's governance system, while offering potential solutions in context. With an emphasis on connecting corporate governance to practical management, the book provides cutting-edge material comprising new and unique study tools and fresh, thought-provoking content.