Corporate Law

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The German Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof) recently had the opportunity to clarify a number of important practical questions of corporate law in connection with asset disposals, the allocation of responsibilities among directors and transactions concluded with board members. We summarize the three relevant decisions from 2018/2019 below.
Continue Reading Recent Important Corporate Law Decisions by German Federal Court of Justice

On January 1, 2019, the “Act on Further Development of Part-Time Employment Law” (Gesetz zur Weiterentwicklung des Teilzeitrechts) entered into force in Germany.

The new legislation implements considerable changes to the German Part-Time and Fixed-Term Employment Act (Teilzeit- und Befristungsgesetz ) and introduces (i) an entitlement to work part-time on a temporary basis, coupled with (ii) an entitlement to return to full-time employment (so-called “Bridge Part-Time Work” (Brückenteilzeit)).
Continue Reading “Bridge Part-Time Work” in Germany

The market reaction to reports of harassment and misconduct in the wake of the #MeToo movement has led to a re-evaluation of the materiality of these complaints from a due diligence perspective, both in the context of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and securities offerings. Companies and lawyers therefore need to re-examine the due diligence process,…

The German Government published a draft legislation which would facilitate the dismissal of so-called “risk takers” in the German financial sector.  This is one of various measures by which the German Government intends to address upcoming Brexit challenges and to increase the attractiveness of Germany as business location for financial institutions currently based in the UK.

Current Legal Situation

German employees are benefitting from extensive protection against dismissal.  Under German labor law, the termination of an employment relationship requires a valid justification (e.g., redundancy or misconduct) for which the German labor courts have set high standards.  Therefore, the affected employee is often in a good position to challenge the validity of the termination and claim the continuation of the employment relationship before court.Continue Reading German Government Plans to Reduce Dismissal Protection for “Risk Takers” in the Financial Sector

Under proposed regulations issued yesterday (October 31), U.S. multinationals would generally be relieved from the “Section 956 deemed dividend rules” that have significantly limited their ability to provide lenders with credit support (for example, in the form of guarantees and collateral) from their non-U.S. subsidiaries. In general, under the proposed regulations, the credit packages provided…

On May 14, 2018, certain members of the CBS board filed suit in Delaware seeking authorization to issue a special dividend intended to dilute the voting control of NAI, CBS’s controlling stockholder. Shortly after NAI filed a countersuit on May 29, 2018, NAI moved to compel the production of certain communications involving CBS’s outside and in-house counsel, including privileged documents concerning the decision to declare the dilutive dividend. NAI’s motion raised important issues regarding the rights of board members to access privileged communications with company counsel, which we discuss in our latest post.
Continue Reading Lessons Learned from the CBS-NAI Dispute: Rights of Board Members to Access Privileged Communications with Company Counsel

The recent dispute between CBS and its controlling stockholder, National Amusements (NAI), should serve as a reminder that determining whether a director is “independent” is context specific. This post summarizes the applicable standards regarding independence and discusses how and when varying standards should be utilized in the context of controlled companies.
Continue Reading Lessons From the CBS-NAI Dispute: Who is an “Independent” Director in the Context of a Controlled Company

In the CBS-NAI litigation, the Court of Chancery denied CBS’s request for a TRO, which would have prevented NAI from exercising its rights as a controlling stockholder to protect its voting control before the CBS board could attempt to dilute such control. This important decision resolved an “apparent tension” in the law between the rights of boards and controlling stockholders in disputes over corporate control.
Continue Reading Lessons from the CBS-NAI Dispute: When (If Ever) Will the Court of Chancery Grant a TRO To Restrain a Controlling Stockholder From Taking Action to Prevent a Board From Diluting Its Voting Control?

This is the third in a series of posts discussing certain issues and lessons for practitioners arising out of the recently settled dispute between CBS and its controlling stockholder.[1]Relevant background can be found here and additional posts in this series can be found here.

As described in a prior post, on May 17, 2018, the majority of the CBS board (other than the three directors with ties to NAI) considered and purported to approve a dividend of a fraction of a Class A (voting) share to be paid to holders of both CBS’s Class A (voting) common stock and Class B (nonvoting) common stock for the express purpose of diluting NAI’s voting interest in CBS, with the payment of such dividend conditioned on Delaware court approval.  In addition to diluting NAI’s voting power from about 80% to about 20%, such dividend would have also diluted the voting rights of other Class A stockholders.
Continue Reading Lessons From the CBS-NAI Dispute: Can Stockholders Rely on Stock Exchange Rules to Prevent Dilution of Their Voting and Economic Interests?

This is the second in a series of posts discussing certain issues and lessons for practitioners arising out of the recently settled dispute between CBS and its controlling stockholder.[1] Relevant background can be found here and additional posts in this series can be found here.

The vast majority of public company shares are owned in “street name” – e.g., through a broker.  When holding shares in “street name,” a stockholder’s brokerage account reflects his or her ultimate beneficial ownership of such shares, but the records of the issuer (maintained by the issuer’s transfer agent) indicate that the broker (or more often, another intermediary through which the broker holds the shares) is the record holder of such shares.  In the typical case of “street name” registration, Cede & Co., as nominee for the Depository Trust Company (“DTC”), is listed on the issuer’s records as the holder of record of most of the issuer’s shares.  DTC, in turn, keeps its own account records, which list the DTC participants that hold those shares through DTC, including a number of brokers.  Finally, those brokers keep their own account records, listing the ultimate beneficial owners of such shares.  Contrast this with direct registration, sometimes referred to as “record ownership,” where the ultimate beneficial holder holds the shares directly and therefore the records of the issuer indicate that such person is also the holder of record of such shares.
Continue Reading Lessons From the CBS-NAI Dispute: The Limitations of “Street Name” Ownership in Effectively Exercising Stockholder Rights