This article shows that the behavior of perfectly rational financial actors can cause financial meltdowns like the ones that occurred in 2007 and 2008. It analyzes the nature of informational asymmetries and group pathologies common in financial transactions and the role of intermediaries and...

Existing incomplete contracting models assume that contracting parties have perfect self-control. This Article approaches the incomplete contracting problem from a new perspective, one that brings to the foreground the potential self-control problems faced by contracting parties. In particular,...

In theory, large institutional investors are in an excellent position to overcome collective action problems and form voting coalitions to actively monitor and discipline managers of public corporations. This article argues that it is highly unlikely that voting coalitions of institutional...

This article argues that repeated criminal misconduct, at least in some areas, has the characteristics of a habit or addiction. Curiosity or a transient attraction can lead an offender to commit her first crime. This first infraction will give her a sense of how much she enjoyed it, and whether...

This article argues that securities lawyers help reduce transactional complexity in initial public offerings by acting as informational intermediaries. The complexity of IPOs is due to three principal factors. First, IPOs involve large number of parties – managers, accountants, underwriters,...

This Article examines the effect of time-inconsistent preferences on the decision-making process of criminal offenders. It shows that even a relatively small preference for immediate gratification and over-optimism about their future self-control can lead hyperbolic criminals to repeatedly...