Difficulty Making Headway on Thorny Issues
As the fourth round of the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with Canada and Mexico drew to a close on Oct.17, the parties opted to push back the starting date of the fifth round until mid-November to allow the negotiators more time to work on the most controversial issues that remain to be addressed. This article explains the issues.
Biopharma companies and their insiders often possess material, nonpublic information. And since company equity usually makes up a large part of insiders' compensation, legal issues arise when they have access to such information and want to trade their equity.
As the adoption of cryptocurrencies spreads throughout the business and financial sectors, so too do the concerns that lack of regulation render the new-age currency susceptible to fraud, manipulation, and to being used as a vehicle for money laundering. Nevertheless, recent efforts by U.S. enforcement agencies to apply and enforce financial regulations mean greater scrutiny than ever before.
With expectations for an always-on law firm, significant challenges within the legal industry to maintain competitiveness and perform due practice for cybersecurity and other disaster scenarios come from both clients and regulatory bodies. A comprehensive approach with an end-to-end availability strategy is imperative to mitigate the threats of downtime. And yet, this is easier said than done.
This edition of the Quarterly State Compliance Review looks at some legislation of interest to corporate lawyers that went into effect between Aug. 1 and Oct. 1, 2017, including amendments to Delaware's corporation and LLC laws.
Even the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) can get hacked — and the recently announced cyber attack against the SEC is providing an important wake-up call for U.S. companies regulated by the powerful agency and the attorneys they work with.
SCOTUS Review of Dodd-Frank to Change the Landscape
On June 26, 2017, the Supreme Court granted certiorari in Digital Realty Trust Inc. v. Somers to review a Ninth Circuit decision regarding SEC whistleblowing protections. The Court's ruling is highly anticipated, as it will clarify the landscape for whistleblower protections.
The FTC has faulted social media influencers for failing to disclose the payments behind their seemingly organic endorsements. But the FTC only reached settlements with the companies, raising a question of when — if ever — the agency would directly go after the influencers.
In his final ruling, Judge Mazzant clarified that he was not questioning the DOL's authority to adopt a salary level test as part of the overtime exemptions. Rather, Judge Mazzant explained that the Obama-era DOL had gone too far in adopting a salary level so high as to become the "de-facto" test for meeting the overtime exemptions.
Judge Mazzant issued a final ruling striking down the overtime rule. The Texas Federal Judge used essentially the same reasoning on which he based his temporary injunction ruling. In light of this final decision, the appeal of his temporary injunction likely becomes moot.
