For nearly half a century, the bundling of research services into commissions that paid for the execution of securities trades has been the focus of both policy discussion and academic debate. The practice whereby asset management firms make use of investor funds to cover the costs of research,...

Systemically important financial institutions are broadly considered to impose a risk to the entire economy upon failure; thus taxpayers act upon their failure, providing them with an implied insurance policy for ongoing liquidity. Yet taxpayers frequently provide de-facto liquidity insurance for...

When investment banks advise on merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions, are they fiduciaries of their clients, gatekeepers for investors, or simply arm's-length counterparties with no other-regarding duties? Scholars have generally treated M&A advisors as arm's-length counterparties, putting...

Banks have been a ubiquitous feature of economic life since at least the 18th century. Yet the transformation that banks have undergone in the past thirty years has made the struggle of making them safe ever harder and more challenging. Arguably, the notion of market discipline aiding financial...

This article examines the regulatory challenges raised by recent, overlooked changes in insurance markets that have led to a functional convergence between insurance and the broader financial sector.The law literature on financial regulation last addressed the issue of convergence over a decade...

When are banks fiduciaries of their customers and clients? This question is of more than theoretical interest given the organizational structure of modern financial institutions and the broad-ranging functions they perform. In this chapter of the Oxford Handbook of Fiduciary Law, I canvass...

After a crisis, broad and sweeping reforms are enacted to restore trust. Following the 2007-2008 Great Financial Crisis, the European Union has engaged in an ambitious overhaul of banking regulation. One of its centerpieces, the 2013 Fourth Capital Requirements Directive (CRD IV), tackles,...

Today, more than five years after Dodd-Frank was first signed into law, uncertainty surrounds many aspects of the Volcker Rule's application and ultimate impact on financial markets and bank stability. Many more years will likely pass before that uncertainty is resolved. We demonstrate through a...