Pending and New Legislation

Operation Choke Point Hysteria: Are Choke Point's Critics Responsible for the Account Closings?

07/17/14

At today's House Judiciary Committee hearing on Operation Choke Point it seemed that Choke Point's critics are conflating a fairly narrow DOJ civil investigation with separate general guidance given by prudential regulators.  In particular, Rep. Issa attempted to tie them together by noting that the DOJ referenced such guidance in its Choke Point subpoenas, but that's quite different than actually bringing a civil action on such a basis (or on the basis of "reputational risk"), which the DOJ has not done.  

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Cooperation and Tolerance in Chapter 15

02/21/14

Chapter 15’s modified universalism structure requires cooperation between courts in different countries as well as tolerance for outcome differences under different bankruptcy laws. While in general it’s fair to say U.S. courts have been cooperative and tolerant, for some reason the issue of intellectual property licenses in bankruptcy brings out the worst in us.

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Article 9 and Bankruptcy Judges

05/15/12

prior post addressed a proposed amendment to Article 9's official comments stating that the date of an Article 9 filing relates back to the initial filing date even if the debtor did NOT authorize the filing at that time. This post returns to that topic for two reasons. First, although it is risky to generalize, I sense that bankruptcy judges may still be unaware of this proposed am

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Promoting Integrity in the UCC Article 9 Recording System

03/16/12

On January 1, 2011, Larry files a UCC-1 financing statement against David indicating David's equipment as collateral. At this point, David doesn't even know Larry, has not given him a security interest, and has not authorized this filing. On February 1, 2012, David meets and borrows money from Larry and signs a security agreement listing equipment as collateral (which, under UCC 9-509, automatically authorizes the filing of a financing statement against equipment). What is the relevant date for determining Larry's priority? The language of Article 9

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Consumer Friendly Forms for Bankruptcy

01/28/12

In many respects, bankruptcy is a one-size-fits-all legal process. Yes, there are ample differences in the law (and a world of difference in practice) between the bankruptcy of a large corporation and a typical consumer. But the Bankruptcy Code itself contains plenty of provisions of general applicability. A major example of the one-size-fits-all approach to bankruptcy is the official forms for filing a case.

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