This important book discusses the issue of executive compensation in Anglo-American financial markets following the financial crisis. The book begins by contextualizing the problem facing financial institutions in the US and the UK and argues that appr

The company is under-performing, its share price is trailing, and the CEO gets...a multi-million-dollar raise. This story is familiar, for good reason: as this book clearly demonstrates, structural flaws in corporate governance have produced widespread distortions in executive pay. Pay without Performance presents a disconcerting portrait of managers' influence over their own pay--and of a governance system that must fundamentally change if firms are to be managed in the interest of shareholders. Lucian Bebchuk and Jesse Fried demonstrate that corporate boards have persistently failed to negotiate at arm's length with the executives they are meant to oversee. They give a richly detailed account of how pay practices--from option plans to retirement benefits--have decoupled compensation from performance and have camouflaged both the amount and performance-insensitivity of pay. Executives' unwonted influence over their compensation has hurt shareholders by increasing pay levels and, even more importantly, by leading to practices that dilute and distort managers' incentives. This book identifies basic problems with our current reliance on boards as guardians of shareholder interests. And the solution, the authors argue, is not merely to make these boards more independent of executives as recent reforms attempt to do. Rather, boards should also be made more dependent on shareholders by eliminating the arrangements that entrench directors and insulate them from their shareholders. A powerful critique of executive compensation and corporate governance, Pay without Performance points the way to restoring corporate integrity and improving corporate performance.

Well-functioning financial markets are crucial for the economic well-being and the justice of contemporary societies. The Great Financial Crisis has shown that a perspective that naively trusts in the self-regulating powers of free markets cannot capture what is at stake in understanding and regulating financial markets. The damage done by the Great Financial Crisis, including its distributive consequences, raises serious questions about the justice of financial markets as we know them. This volume brings together leading scholars from political theory, law, and economics in order to explore the relation between justice and financial markets. Broadening the perspective from a purely economic one to a liberal egalitarian one, the volume explores foundational normative questions about how to conceptualize justice in relation to financial markets, the biases in the legal frameworks of financial markets that produce unjust outcomes, and perspectives of justice on specific institutions and practices in contemporary financial markets. Written in a clear and accessible language, the volume presents analyses of how financial markets (should) function and how the Great Financial Crisis came about, proposals for how the structures of financial markets could be reformed, and analysis of why reform is not happening at the speed that would be desirable from a perspective of justice.

This book investigates the pre-crisis practice of bankers' remuneration in the UK to provide evidence of the problems in practice. It critically analyses the regulatory initiatives implemented after the crisis and investigates the post-crisis practice to reflect the effects and problems of the regulation. The book also discusses the traditional administration of remuneration and political incentives in Chinese banks and the regulatory initiatives for reforming bankers' remuneration. It investigates the recent practices in major Chinese banks to reveal the problems of the regulatory initiatives and the impact of political incentives. It will help academics, researchers, students and practitioners develop a comprehensive understanding of the ongoing reform of bankers' remuneration in the UK and the uniqueness of banks' remuneration systems and incentive mechanisms in China. Furthermore, it provides theoretical insights into the differences between the two jurisdictions in their regulations and practices and the deep-seated reasons for the differences.

Controlling Capital examines three pressing issues in financial market regulation: the contested status of public regulation, the emergence of ‘culture’ as a proposed modality of market governance, and the renewed ascendancy of private regulation. In the years immediately following the outbreak of crisis in financial markets, public regulation seemed almost to be attaining a position of command – the robustness and durability of which is explored here in respect of market conduct, European Union capital markets union, and US and EU competition policies. Subsequently there has been a softening of command and a return to public-private co-regulation, positioned within a narrative on culture. The potential and limits of culture as a regulatory resource are unpacked here in respect of occupational and organisational aspects, stakeholder connivance and wider political embeddedness. Lastly the book looks from both appreciative and critical perspectives at private regulation, through financial market associations, arbitration of disputes and, most controversially, market ‘policing’ by hedge funds. Bringing together a distinguished group of international experts, this book will be a key text for all those concerned with issues arising at the intersection of financial markets, law, culture and governance.

An exciting new textbook which presents critical perspectives on corporate and commercial law. Focussing on the key areas of trade and transactions, intellectual property, corporations and finance, it covers each of the areas of commercial and company law that would typically be offered to undergraduate and postgraduate law students. The chapters are written by acknowledged experts in the field and are aimed at undergraduates, post graduates and lecturers who wish to further their understanding of this area. Each of the authors focuses on an area within their subject and draws out the political, the controversial and the discursive, providing essential reading for undergraduate dissertation topics and postgraduate analysis.

This book puts forward a holistic approach to post-crisis derivatives regulation, providing insight into how new regulation has dealt with the risk that OTC derivatives pose to financial stability. It discusses the implications that post crisis regulation has had on central counterparties and the risk associated with clearing of OTC derivatives. The author offers a novel solution to tackle the potential negative externalities from the failure of a central counterparty and identifies potential new risks arising from post crisis reforms.

Focusing primarily on the banking system in the United States, this book offers an innovative framework that integrates a depository bank’s liquidity and its capital adequacy into a unified notion of funding that helps to explain how the 2007–2008 crisis unfolded, why central banks succeeded in resolving the crisis, and how the conceptual legacy of the crisis and its resolution led to lasting changes in bank funding regulation, including new objective requirements for bank liquidity. To provide a comparative context, the book also examines the funding models of non-bank intermediaries like dealer banks and insurers.

The European Banking Union and the Role of Law offers a comprehensive and unique examination of the European Banking Union’s (EBU) impact on existing legal disciplines and assesses the role of law in shaping the EBU framework.

A heavily debated topic, the evolution of shareholders’ duties risks the transformation of the very concept of shareholder primacy, crucially associated with shareholder rights. Offering a distinctive and comprehensive examination of both current and forthcoming enforcement mechanisms in the area of shareholder duties, this timely book provides an exhaustive analysis of the many issues related to these mechanisms, and considers the ongoing challenges surrounding their implementation.