There is an ongoing debate over whether or not a trademark is “property,” and what the appropriate boundaries of such a property right might be. Some scholars assert that rules and justifications developed to handle rights in real property are generally a poor fit for intellectual property...

We study the effects of trademark protection on firm profits and strategy using the 1996 Federal Trademark Dilution Act, which granted additional legal protection to selected trademarks. We find that the FTDA raised treated firms' operating profits and was followed by a spike in trademark...

This paper investigates the relationship between the innovative activity of the top corporate R&D investors worldwide and their valuation on the financial markets. The empirical analysis is based on a sample of more than 1,500 top publicly listed Multinational Corporations (MNCs) performing a...

Trademark protection is a policy instrument situated at the core of firm marketing and innovation strategy. One underexplored factor directly affecting firms' use of trademarks relates to the fees associated with obtaining a mark. This paper provides econometric estimates of the fee elasticity...

May 20, 2019 witnessed the promulgation of a judgement by the United States Supreme Court which settled a circuit split created by the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit and answered a question which was the subject of quandary for the American legal fraternity for more than 35 years. A...

The doctrines of trademark genericism and functionality serve similar functions under the Lanham Act and the common law of unfair competition. Genericism, in the context of word marks, and functionality, for trade dress, bar trademark registration under the Lanham Act and, both under the Act and...

Using the passage of the Federal Trademark Dilution Act (FTDA) as an exogenous shock to trademark protection, we find that stronger trademark protection induces firms to increase their CEO risk-taking incentives as measured by CEO portfolio vega. The effect is greater for firms facing more...

The economic approach to trademark law has reigned supreme for almost two decades. Yet few have critically examined the theory. This article seeks to do just that. The economic approach has stripped trademark philosophy of much of its inherent flexibility and normative depth. At its core,...