Monthly Archives: February 2015

Delaware in 2014: Increasing Deference to Directors’ Decision

Posted by Yaron Nili, Co-editor, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, on
Tuesday, February 3, 2015
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The following post comes to us from David N. Shine, partner and co-head of the Mergers and Acquisitions Practice at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP, and is based on a Fried Frank publication by Mr. Shine, Steven Epstein, Philip Richter and Gail Weinstein. 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.

A foundational premise of Delaware jurisprudence has been the courts’ deference to decisions made by independent and disinterested directors. Over the last year, the Delaware courts have continued a trend in their opinions toward increased judicial deference to the decisions of independent and disinterested directors. Thus, for example, the Delaware Supreme Court’s seminal MFW decision provides a roadmap to business judgment review even of controller transactions (which used to be reviewed under an entire fairness standard).

Other than MFW, however, the courts have not changed the fundamental ground rules for review of a sale process. Thus, as in the past:

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A Smarter Way to Tax Big Banks

Posted by Mark Roe, Harvard Law School, on
Monday, February 2, 2015
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Mark Roe is the David Berg Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, where he teaches bankruptcy and corporate law. This post is based on an op-ed by Professor Roe and Michael Tröge that was published today in The Wall Street Journal, which can be found here.

In conjunction with his State of the Union address, President Obama reanimated the idea of taxing big banks’ debts to help stabilize the banking industry and prevent future financial crises. The administration argues that the new tax would discourage banks from taking on too much risk by making it “more costly for the biggest financial firms to finance their activities with excessive borrowing.”

The president’s bank-tax proposal is unlikely to gain traction in the new Congress, just as similar proposals from the administration in 2010 and, last year from the now retired Rep. David Camp (R., Mich.), did not move forward. But even if it became law, it wouldn’t put a sizable dent in bank debt. The reason is simple: The existing tax system strongly encourages debt finance and the proposed new tax will not fundamentally change this.

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ISS 2015 Equity Plan Scorecard FAQs

Posted by Carol Bowie, Institutional Shareholder Services Inc., on
Monday, February 2, 2015
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Carol Bowie is Head of Americas Research at Institutional Shareholder Services Inc. (ISS). This post relates to ISS’ Equity Plan Scorecard for 2015.

General Questions

1. What is the basis for ISS’ new scorecard approach for evaluating equity compensation proposals?

The new policy will allow more nuanced consideration of equity incentive programs, which are critical for motivating and aligning the interests of key employees with shareholders, but which also fuel the lion’s share of executive pay and may be costly without providing superior benefits to shareholders. While most plan proposals pass, they tend to get broader and deeper opposition than, for example, say-on-pay proposals (e.g., only 60% of Russell 3000 equity plan proposals garnered support of 90% or more of votes cast in 2014 proxy season, versus almost 80% of say-on-pay proposals that received that support level). The voting patterns indicate that most investors aren’t fully satisfied with many plans.

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2014 Delaware Decisions and What They Mean For 2015

Posted by Yaron Nili, Co-editor, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, on
Monday, February 2, 2015
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The following post comes to us from John L. Reed, chair of the Wilmington Litigation group and a partner in the Corporate and Litigation groups at DLA Piper LLP, and is based on portions of a DLA Piper Corporate Update; the complete publication is available here. 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.

Delaware has long been known as the corporate capital of the world, and it is now the state of incorporation for 66 percent of the Fortune 500 and more than half of all companies whose securities trade on the NYSE, Nasdaq and other exchanges. Each year, the Delaware courts issue a number of significant opinions demonstrating that the Delaware courts are neither stockholder nor management biased. Many of those recent and important cases are discussed in this post, which is intended to provide sufficient detail so as to be helpful to in-house counsel, but is also written in a way so that the often-long and complex Delaware decisions can be easily understood by directors and other fiduciaries. Takeaway observations are also provided.

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SEC Proposes Increased Thresholds for Exchange Act Registration

Posted by David S. Huntington, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP, on
Sunday, February 1, 2015
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David Huntington is a partner in the Capital Markets and Securities Group at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP. This post is based on a Paul Weiss client memorandum.

In December 2014, the SEC proposed rules under the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act (the “JOBS Act”) that reflect new, higher thresholds for registration under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (the “Exchange Act”). The SEC also proposed rules that would implement higher thresholds for termination of registration and suspension of reporting for banks and bank holding companies and savings and loan holding companies. In addition, the SEC has proposed to revise the definition of “held of record” in Exchange Act Rule 12g5-1 to exclude certain securities held by persons who received them pursuant to employee compensation plans and to establish a non-exclusive safe harbor for determining whether securities are “held of record” for purposes of registration under Exchange Act Section 12(g).

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