The coronavirus pandemic is creating overwhelming needs, in three waves. First is the health crisis; second is the macroeconomic crisis created by the abrupt halt in much business activity; and now third is a consumer crisis, as households are faced with total or partial job loss, sharp income...

How different are common law and civil law legal systems? This question has occupied legal scholars for a long time. In the last 15 years the common law/civil law divide has also become a major theme in research of economics, finance and business. In many studies it is alleged that English legal...

Angel investors finance small high growth entrepreneurial firms in exchange for equity. Unlike private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) funds, which invest capital from institutional investors, angels invest with their own money. We compare the impact from legal and cultural conditions on...

Fraud and irrationality are often blamed for financial manias and panics. Investor euphoria can unleash social and technological breakthroughs, but the subsequent failures can destroy value and radicalize the political sphere. Are these events random, idiosyncratic, or driven by some force? The...

Insolvency proceedings and issues relating to personal and business insolvencies are the daily subject of scholarly work and insolvency practice. But what is an insolvency proceeding? And why is this an important question? This article deals with a specific regulatory problem that is raised by...

We document that the choice between disintermediated individual angel investments and intermediated private equity and venture capital investments depends on legal, economic, and cultural differences. We find evidence of this using PitchBook's comprehensive data on more than 5,000 angel and...

We conjecture that angel investment in entrepreneurial firms depends on two types of bankruptcy laws around the world. Corporate bankruptcy laws impact investor terms and incentives to finance risky entrepreneurs, particularly given reforms that brought about a time-efficient, simplified, and...

THE RIGHT OF PUBLICITY: PRIVACY REIMAGINED FOR A PUBLIC WORLD (Harvard University Press 2018), 256 pages, considers the opportunities and risks that today’s right of publicity laws pose. The right of publicity has become a negative force ― suppressing speech, blocking otherwise lawful uses...

This chapter surveys some of the actors in sovereign debt restructurings. Millhouse’s quote above underscores the number and diversity of players in municipal insolvencies. Nevertheless, the number and heterogeneity of the actors involved in municipal and corporate bankruptcies pale in...

For a long time, the European insolvency laws have been considered as country-specific regulations, entirely focused on national needs and expectations. This perception depends on several factors. First, the debtor’s financial distress tends to be systematic by naturally expanding its effects...