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Franchisee Associations See Item 20 Disclosure Plan as One Step Forward, Two Steps Back
The Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) long-awaited Staff Report recommends the retention of an important advancement for the benefit of prospective franchisees: the mandated disclosure of trademark-specific franchisee associations in Item 20. Many franchisee advocates viewed this provision in the October 1999 Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPR) as a laudable recognition of the legitimate and constructive role that franchisee associations can and do play in our industry, including as an unfiltered source of information for prospective franchisees.
Providing this source of information is essential, given the absence of mandated financial performance information in Item 19, the prevalence of the use of broad confidentially agreements in franchise agreements and settlement agreements, and the fact that the franchisee roster in Item 20 need not contain more that 100 names. The NPR proposal builds on the body of statutory and regulatory law in 11 states that explicitly protects the rights of franchisees to freely associate and a line of judicial decisions that demonstrates the willingness of judges and juries to find creative ways to punish franchisors that retaliate against franchisee association members and leaders. (For extensive treatment of this precedent, see Karp, “The Right of Franchisees to Freely Associate Bolstered by Legislation and the Courts,” FBLA, Volume 6, Number 7, April 2000.)
Bankruptcy Sales: Finding a Diamond In the Rough
There is no efficient market for the sale of bankruptcy assets. Inefficient markets yield a transactional drag, potentially dampening the ability of debtors and trustees to maximize value for creditors. This article identifies ways in which investors may more easily discover bankruptcy asset sales.
Judge Rules Shaquille O'Neal Will Face Securities Lawsuit for Promotion, Sale of NFTs
A federal district court in Miami, FL, has ruled that former National Basketball Association star Shaquille O'Neal will have to face a lawsuit over his promotion of unregistered securities in the form of cryptocurrency tokens and that he was a "seller" of these unregistered securities.
Why So Many Great Lawyers Stink at Business Development and What Law Firms Are Doing About It
Why is it that those who are best skilled at advocating for others are ill-equipped at advocating for their own skills and what to do about it?
Blockchain Domains: New Developments for Brand Owners
Blockchain domain names offer decentralized alternatives to traditional DNS-based domain names, promising enhanced security, privacy and censorship resistance. However, these benefits come with significant challenges, particularly for brand owners seeking to protect their trademarks in these new digital spaces.
'Insurable Interest' and the Scope of First-Party Coverage
This article reviews the fundamental underpinnings of the concept of insurable interest, and certain recent cases that have grappled with the scope of insurable interest and have articulated a more meaningful application of the concept to claims under first-party property policies.