Yearly Archives: 2014

Proxy Access in the US

Posted by Kobi Kastiel, Co-editor, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, on
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
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The following post comes to us from Matt Orsagh, director at CFA Institute, and is based on the summary of a CFA publication, titled Proxy Access in the United States: Revisiting the Proposed SEC Rule; the complete publication is available here.

In this summary of CFA Institute findings, we take a brief look at the history of proxy access, discuss the pertinent academic studies, examine the benefits and limits of cost–benefit analysis, analyze the use of proxy access in non-US jurisdictions, and draw some conclusions.

How We Got Here

Proxy access refers to the ability of shareowners to place their nominees for director on a company’s proxy ballot. This right is available in many markets, though not in the United States. Supporters of proxy access argue that it increases the accountability of corporate boards by allowing shareowners to nominate a limited number of board directors. Afraid that special-interest groups could hijack the process, opponents of proxy access are also concerned about its cost and are not convinced that proxy access would improve either company or board performance.

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Shareholder Scrutiny and Executive Compensation

Posted by R. Christopher Small, Co-editor, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, on
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
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The following post comes to us from Mathias Kronlund of the Department of Finance at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Shastri Sandy of the Department of Finance at the University of Missouri at Columbia.

As a result of the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010, public firms must periodically hold advisory shareholder votes on executive compensation (“say on pay”). One of the main goals of the say-on-pay mandate is to increase shareholder scrutiny of executive pay, and thus alleviate perceived governance problems when boards decide on executive compensation. In our paper, Does Shareholder Scrutiny Affect Executive Compensation? Evidence from Say-on-Pay Voting, which was recently made publicly available on SSRN, we examine how firms change the structure and level of executive compensation depending on whether the firm will face a say-on-pay vote or not.

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Key Privacy Issues in M&A Transactions

Posted by Yaron Nili, Co-editor, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, on
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
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The following post comes to us from Paul A. Chandler, Counsel at Mayer Brown LLP, and is based on a Mayer Brown Legal Update by Mr. Chandler and Lei Shen.

Many merger and acquisition (“M&A”) agreements lack specific representations and warranties regarding privacy issues. Often, this is because deal lawyers do not recognize potential privacy risks where the target company (the “Target”) lacks e-commerce websites or retail stores that collect consumer data. Nonetheless, significant privacy issues may exist even if the Target is a traditional “brick and mortar” business. Early attention to privacy issues in M&A transaction planning and due diligence can mitigate risks for both buyers and sellers.

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The Institutional Framework for Cost Benefit Analysis in Financial Regulation

Posted by June Rhee, Co-editor, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, on
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
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The following post comes to us from Robert Bartlett, Professor of Law at UC Berkeley School of Law.

Four years after the enactment of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank), the use of cost benefit analysis (CBA) in financial regulation has come to play a critical role in an increasingly heated debate concerning the statute’s implementation. Requiring nearly three hundred rule-makings across twenty agencies, Dodd-Frank’s enormous regulatory mandate represents for many an especially dangerous risk of the typical “drift” and “slack” problems long associated with administrative rule-making. The fact that Dodd-Frank was enacted in the midst of an economic recession only heightens these fears, particularly the concern that overworked and/or overzealous agencies might discharge their regulatory mandate by promulgating cost-insensitive regulations. In light of these concerns, a number of Congressional proposals now exist that would subject financial rule-making to more formal CBA reflecting the conventional belief that rigorous CBA can provide much-needed accountability over regulatory agencies.

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Delaware Reaffirms that Corporate Control Lies in the Boardroom

Posted by Edward D. Herlihy, Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, on
Monday, October 20, 2014
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Edward D. Herlihy is a partner and co-chairman of the Executive Committee at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz. The following post is based on a Wachtell Lipton memorandum authored by Mr. Herlihy, William Savitt, David E. Shapiro, and Ryan A. McLeod. This post is part of the Delaware law series, which is cosponsored by the Forum and Corporation Service Company; links to other posts in the series are available here.

In an important ruling [October 14, 2014], the Delaware Court of Chancery dismissed a merger challenge on the pleadings and reaffirmed the primacy of director authority, the significance of the vote of disinterested stockholders, and the vibrancy of the business judgment rule. In re KKR Fin. Holdings LLC S’holder Litig., C.A. No. 9210-CB (Del. Ch. Oct. 14, 2014).

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Corporate Governance and the Creation of the SEC

Posted by R. Christopher Small, Co-editor, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, on
Monday, October 20, 2014
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The following post comes to us from Arevik Avedian of Harvard Law School; Henrik Cronqvist, Professor of Finance from China Europe International Business School (CEIBS); and Marc Weidenmier, Professor of Economics at Claremont Colleges.

Severe turmoil in financial markets—whether the Panic of 1826, the Wall Street Crash of 1929, or the Global Financial Crisis of 2008—often raises significant concerns about the effectiveness of pre-existing securities market regulation. In turn, such concerns tend to result in calls for more and stricter government regulation of corporations and financial markets. It is widely considered that the most significant change to U.S. financial regulation in the past 100 years was the Securities Act of 1933 and the subsequent creation of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to enforce it. Before the SEC creation, federal securities market regulation was essentially absent in the U.S. In our paper, Corporate Governance and the Creation of the SEC, which was recently made publicly available on SSRN, we examine how companies listing in the U.S. responded to this significant increase in the provision of government-sponsored corporate governance. Specifically, did this landmark legislation have any significant effects on board governance (e.g., the independence of boards) and firm valuations?

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Disclosure and Financial Market Regulation

Posted by June Rhee, Co-editor, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, on
Sunday, October 19, 2014
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The following post comes to us from Luca Enriques, Allen & Overy Professor of Corporate Law at University of Oxford, Faculty of Law, and Sergio Gilotta of University of Bologna.

In our recent paper, Disclosure and Financial Market Regulation, we provide a critical overview of the role of disclosure in financial market regulation.

We begin by discussing the goals of disclosure regulation, which we identify in investor protection, agency cost reduction and price accuracy enhancement. Disclosure protects investors because (a) it gives them the information that is needed in order to make correct investment decisions, (b) it prevents them from being “exploited” by traders having superior information, and (c) it constrains managers’ and controlling shareholders’ opportunistic behavior. In this last respect, the goal of investor protection equates that of agency cost reduction.

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FINRA To Propose Market Structure Actions

Posted by Annette L. Nazareth, Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, on
Saturday, October 18, 2014
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Annette Nazareth is a partner in the Financial Institutions Group at Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP, and a former commissioner at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The following post is based on a Davis Polk client memorandum.

On September 19, 2014, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (“FINRA”) announced that its Board of Governors (the “Board”) approved a series of regulatory initiatives primarily focused on equity and fixed income market structure issues. This is a direct response by FINRA to two important speeches this summer by SEC Chair Mary Jo White, in which she articulated an ambitious agenda of market structure reforms. [1]

The Board authorized FINRA staff to prepare Regulatory Notices soliciting comments or issuing guidance on the following:

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APG Asset Management Issues Remuneration Guidelines

Posted by Yaron Nili, Co-editor, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, on
Friday, October 17, 2014
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The following post comes to us from David Shammai, Senior Governance Specialist and Martijn Olthof, Senior Portfolio Manager, both at APG Asset Management. APG’s remuneration guidelines are available here.

One of the world largest fiduciary asset managers, APG recently issued remuneration guidelines that will be applied to its portfolio of European listed companies. APG believes that the innovation in the new guidelines is twofold. First in that they are based on its practical experience of company engagements and therefore reflect an integrated investment and governance outlook. More specifically, the guidelines place a clear emphasis on value creation. By issuing the guidelines APG is aiming to make its ongoing discussions with companies around pay more effective, thus freeing up time for it to focus on other important corporate governance areas such as board structure, succession and nominations.

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Directors Should Communicate with Shareholders

Posted by John Wilcox, Sodali, on
Thursday, October 16, 2014
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John Wilcox is chairman of Sodali and former Head of Corporate Governance at TIAA-CREF. This post is based on a Sodali publication by Mr. Wilcox.

To demonstrate their effectiveness, corporate boards should increase transparency, provide an annual report of boardroom activities and take charge of their relations with shareholders.

With shareholders continuing to press for ever-deepening levels of engagement, companies must find a way to answer the most basic question of corporate governance: “How effective is the board of directors?” It is a question that can only be answered by the board itself, but it presents directors with a challenge as well as an opportunity. The challenge is to overcome the mindset, habits and perceived risks that have long kept boardroom activities under wraps. The opportunity, on the other hand, is to define governance and strategic issues from the board’s perspective, manage shareholder expectations, take the engagement initiative away from shareholders and reduce the likelihood of activism. Directors should give careful consideration to this opportunity. Over the long term, it will be far better for companies to control the process by which board transparency is achieved rather than waiting for yet again another set of governance reforms that could further erode the board’s authority.

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