This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of the death of James M. Landis, one of the most pivotal entrepreneurs in regulatory history. A key architect of the Securities and Exchange Commission, established eighty years ago, and former Dean of Harvard Law School (1937-1946), Landis and his conception of regulatory purpose has largely been relegated in part because of an investigation into his personal tax affairs that did much to besmirch his legacy. In advance of a major panel discussion at Harvard Law School on November 24, 2014, Justin O’Brien evaluates the abiding strength of the approach to regulatory design advanced by Landis, drawing on a major article on “too big to fail” just published in Law and Financial Markets Review and his monograph The Triumph, Tragedy and Lost Legacy of James M Landis (Hart Publishing, 2014).
11-11:45am: Keynote and response 12-12:50pm: Roundtable discussion
James M. Landis – scholar, administrator, advocate, and political adviser – is known for his seminal contribution to the creation of the modern system of market regulation in the USA. As a highly influential participant in the policies of the New Deal, he drafted the statute that was to become the foundation for securities regulation in the US, and, by extension, the founding principle of financial market regulation across the world. A former Dean of Harvard Law School (1937-1946), he was also a complex and in...
In the second of an international series of four major workshops, scholars, practitioners, and regulators explore the divergent enforcement agendas followed in the aftermath of the financial benchmark and broader currency manipulation scandals. The workshop builds on the pioneering work of lab on institutional corruption and the Centre for Law, Markets, and Regulation at UNSW on the dynamics of regulatory policy. It assesses the trajectories of the investigative and enforcement process across multiple markets and fuses detailed empirical analysis with recommendations for policy reform...
The Southern District of New York federal courthouse on Pearl Street in Lower Manhattan has emerged as the crucible for an increasingly pointed debate on the future of financial regulation. It is here that the intersection between law and morality, prosecutorial and regulatory purpose and acumen, personal conduct and the financial services industry’s commitment to market integrity is being played out.
SYDNEY: 5 December 2013 - The European Union investigation into rate manipulation of critical financial benchmarks has generated the largest cartel fine in history. Six global banks—JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup, Société Générale, UBS, RBS and Barclays—have paid a total of €1.71billion ($2.3 billion) in an attempt to put the scandal behind them. The settlement, however, marks the beginning rather than the end of a process.
It is somewhat ironic that Steve Cutler, a former head of enforcement at the Securities and Exchange Commission, should serve as the general counsel for J.P. Morgan, a corporation that has just negotiated the largest single penalty in history. Less ironic and more serious for Wall Street are the signals the $13 billion settlement provides of likely future enforcement trajectories.
Justin O’Brien sets out an agenda to embed warranted confidence
The most striking aspect of the announcement by the British Banking Association of its plans to overhaul the process by which the daily London Interbank Offered Rate (Libor) is set is its piecemeal nature. From July 1 there is to be a three-month delay before publication of individual submissions.
