On March 8, 2019, Judge Wilken, a California District Court judge, ruled for the second time that the NCAA is unlawfully conspiring to suppress compensation of student athletes who play at the highest level of college football and basketball.1 This case, Alston v. NCAA, featured former and current Division I athletes seeking an injunction against…
Category: Blog Articles
Michigan Defamation Law and Businesses
The reputations of businesspeople and of businesses matter. Someone spreading nasty rumors about a businessperson or business can have a drastic effect on performance, client relations, and employee morale, among other things. How can businesspeople and businesses protect themselves? Each state has had to grapple with this question. In Michigan, however, there is a curious…
Marketing Battles Spur Litigation: MillerCoors sues Bud Light
If you were watching this year’s Super Bowl, you likely saw ads by Anheuser-Busch for Bud Light. These ads highlighted the fact that MillerCoors products, specifically, Miller Lite and Coors Light, are brewed using corn syrup, while Bud Light is not. The ads were immediately met with backlash from corn lobbying groups, who fear that…
Too Big To Fail Doesn’t Mean they Won’t
On March 11th, 2019, a federal court in Manhattan convicted KPMG’s former national managing partner for audit quality, David Middendorf, on conspiracy and wire fraud charges for to his role in the ‘steal the exam’ scandal which involved executives and employees from both KPMG and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB).1 In January of…
Security Regulations: When in Rome, Use a Trebuchet
Thanks to the meticulous work of Pythagoras, humans have known for two and half millennia that a line is the shortest distance between two points.1 Despite this knowledge and a general desire for efficiency, societies have often failed to incorporate this principle into systems. Take, for example, last century BC Rome, home of the milliarium…
Reconsidering Tax Policy on Constructive Receipt
Nonqualified deferred compensation arrangements are commonplace among executives in the American workforce. These arrangements raise tax timing issues for our cash-basis accounting system. When should the compensation be determined to have been “constructively received” by the worker, and thus subject to taxation? Our policy on the issue was originally too lenient in the wake of…
The European Union vs. Silicon Valley
The European Union dealt a blow to major online service providers when the European Parliament approved an overhaul to existing copyright laws that place an affirmative duty on the tech industry’s biggest players to monitor their websites for potentially infringing content. The Copyright Directive, as it’s called, has been the subject of intense lobbying from…
Delaware Chancery: No Fiduciary Duty To Maximize Earn Out In Acquisitions
Fiduciary duties typically require one to act in the best interests of their beneficiary, even if those interests may conflict with their own. This can present issues when part of the consideration for an acquisition is contingent on the future performance of the target, otherwise known as an “earn out.” If the buyer completely controls…
Financial Inclusion and VAT Treatment of Mobile Money Services
Innovations in the financial sector have broadened access to finance and altered the operation of capital markets. One of the fastest-growing financial technologies (Fintech) resulting from the digital revolution is mobile money services, where customers use their mobile device to receive, store and spend money. As the advent of Fintech baffles lawyers and regulators alike,…
Private Ownership and Practical Practice in Major Law Firms
Major law firms are anachronisms according to the logic of the cool-headed economists and management theorists. Ever since Berle and Means first preached the division of owners and managers in their seminal work, most shareholders exist separately from management, preferring a passive voice when it comes to directing the actions of their firms, and by…