For nearly two years, the two of us have had a running discussion of the costs and benefits of automatic stays in bankruptcy for qualified financial contracts (QFCs) such as derivatives and repurchase agreements, particularly those held by systemically important major dealer banks. Under current...

What are the costs of congested court systems? This paper studies the 2005 consumer bankruptcy reform, which caused the largest recorded drop in the caseload of bankruptcy courts in the United States. The reform changed the law for individual debtors but left corporate bankruptcies unaffected....

It is well understood that the equity of an insolvent firm can trade for a positive price so long as there is some positive probability that the firm will become solvent at some future point. Currently, however, this insight exists in the case law in an informal sense, while its use in the...

We examine how creditor protection affects firms with different levels of owners' and managers' personal costs of bankruptcy. Theoretically, we show that firms with high personal costs of bankruptcy borrow and invest more under a more debtor-friendly management stay system, whereas firms with...

When contemplating Chapter 11, firms often need to seek financing for their continuing operations in bankruptcy. Because such financing would otherwise be hard to find, the Bankruptcy Code authorizes debtors to offer sweeteners to debtor-in-possession (DIP) lenders. These inducements can be...

This Article argues that the liability framework governing securities trading is unable to effectively deter and compensate harms in algorithmic markets. Theory underscores the significance of robust laws to safeguard information flows and the trading process. Without this assurance, investors...