A brand new Arizona case continues the trend of incorrectly discussing limited liability companies (LLCs) as limited liability corporations, but it does allow for an interesting look at how entities are sometimes treated (or not) in laws and regulations. Here’s the opening paragraph of the case:

Noah Sensibar appeals from the superior court’s ruling affirming the Tucson City Court’s finding that he had violated the Tucson City Code (TCC). He argues that the municipal ordinance in question is facially invalid because it conflicts with a state statute shielding members or agents of a limited liability corporation from personal liability. 

City of Tucson v. Noah Sensibar, No. 2 CA-CV 2017-0087, 2018 WL 703319 (Ariz. Ct. App. Feb. 5, 2018).

About three years ago, the City of Tucson alleged that Sensibar, as “the managing member and statutory agent of Blue Jay Real Estate LLC, an Arizona corporation, was responsible for building code violations.” Id. (emphasis added). Notwithstanding the incorrect characterization of the entity type, it looks like the court at least reasonable (though not clearly correct) to hold Sensibar individually liable.  Here’s why:

The Tuscon City Code states that “Any owner or responsible party who commits, causes, permits, facilitates or aids or abets any violation of any provision of this chapter . . . is responsible for a civil infraction and is subject to a civil sanction of not less than one hundred dollars ($100.00) nor more than two thousand five hundred dollars ($2,500.00).” Tucson Code Sec. 16-48(2) (Violations and penalties).

The Code Definitions in Sec. 16-3 provide the following:

Owner means, as applied to a building, structure, or land, any part owner, joint owner, tenant in common, joint tenant or tenant by the entirety of the whole or a part of such building, structure or land.

. . . .

Person means any natural person, firm, partnership, association, corporation, company or organization of any kind, but not the federal government, state, county, city or political subdivision of the state.

. . .  .

Responsible party means an occupant, lessor, lessee, manager, licensee, or person having control over a structure or parcel of land; and in any case where the demolition of a structure is proposed as a means of abatement, any lienholder whose lien is recorded in the official records of the Pima County Recorder’s Office.

As such, the Code seems to contemplate holding both entities and individuals liable. Still, Sensibar had an argument. The use of the term “manager” here causes some potential confusion because one can be a manager of an LLC, while the LLC might serve as the manager of the property. Thus, it could be that only the LLC should be liable.  Another plausible reading, though, is that “manager” meant the natural person doing the managing as is common in property situations.  Manager, like occupant, lessee, and lessor, is not defined in the Code, so it would seem the intended source of the definitions should be from a property perspective, not an entity perspective.

Similarly, the Code could mean a natural “person having control over a structure” can be liable.  If that’s the case, and the court seems to have gone down this road, the argument would be that Sensibar was being held liable directly for his role as manager or person in control of the property and not vicariously for violations of the LLC.  Given that occupants, lessors, and lessees, among others, can be held liable, it does appear that the Code could have intended to impose liability directly on multiple parties, including both individuals and entities. This would be sensible, in many contexts, though it would also be sensible to say explicitly, especially given that the term “person” clearly includes entities. 

A simple improvement might be to update the definition of “responsible party,” as follows:

Responsible party means an, whether as an individual or entity, any occupant, lessor, lessee, manager, licensee, or person having control over a structure or parcel of land and in any case where the demolition of a structure is proposed as a means of abatement, any lienholder whose lien is recorded in the official records of the Pima County Recorder’s Office.

That would, at least, be consistent with the decision. Because if the court is holding Sensibar liable for merely being the manager of the LLC, and not as the manager of the property, the case is wrongly decided.  Too bad the notice of appeal was not timely filed – maybe we could have found out. 

UPDATE: Based on a good comment from Tom N., I did a little more research. As of an LLC filing in 2009, Noah Sensibar owned at least a 20% interest. (It may be 50% because there were two listed members, but it was at least 20%.) As such, this suggests that the LLC does not have funding to cover the fines or that express indemnification is lacking and the other member(s) won’t agree to cover the costs from LLC funds. 

I will also note that a 2016 decision denying Sensibar’s appeal stated, “The court also heard evidence that Sensibar, the managing partner of the LLC, was ‘the person in charge’ of the property.”  City of Tucson v. Sensibar, No. 2 CA-CV 2016-0051, 2016 WL 5899737, at *1 (Ariz. Ct. App. Oct. 11, 2016). Seriously? He’s an LLC manager.  That’s all.  LLCs are not corporations OR partnerships. THEY ARE LLCS! 

WOMEN’S LEADERSHIP IN ACADEMIA CONFERENCE

Advancing women professors, librarians, and clinicians in leadership positions in the academy.

Thursday & Friday July 19-20, 2018
University of Georgia School of Law
Athens, Georgia

Call for Proposals!

DEADLINE: Thursday, March 15, 2018

 

The University of Georgia School of Law is proud to organize and host the inaugural Women’s Leadership in Academia Conference. This Conference strives to address the concerns and needs voiced by our respective communities. In response to suggestions from colleagues across the nation, this Conference will offer programming focused on building skills and providing tools and information that are directly applicable to women in legal education looking to be leaders within the academy.
 
To help us create targeted programs of interest, we are looking to the expertise within our diverse community. We invite you to submit a proposal for a conference session. The Planning Committee is looking for proposals in a variety of formats, including hands-on workshops, panel presentations, roundtables, and short lectures. However, we are open to all suggestions and encourage creativity and collaboration with your colleagues. All proposal topics should address the unique perspective and challenges of women, and provide programming that will be useful to developing leaders. We ask all proposed sessions to not exceed 55 minutes in duration. Proposals that provide an intersectional approach to topics are encouraged.
 
To submit a proposal, please download and complete the pdf available below. Right click the link below and select “Save as” (or “Save link as”) to download to your computer. Return the completed proposal by selecting the “submit” button embedded in the form, or emailing a copy to ajshaw@uga.edu. All proposals are due no later than March 15th, 2018.
 
For questions or assistance regarding conference content: please reach out to Associate Dean Usha R. Rodrigues at rodrig@uga.edu.
 
For questions or assistance regarding the proposal form or submission: please reach out to Amanda J. Shaw at ajshaw@uga.edu.

Perhaps I’m a cynic, but I have to admit that I was stunned when the news of hotelier  Steve Wynn’s harassment allegations at the end of January caused a double-digit drop in stock price.  What began as an unseemly story of a $7.5 million settlement to a manicurist at one his of his resorts later morphed into a story about his resignation as head of the finance chair of the Republican National Committee. Not only did he lose that job, he also lost at least $412 million (the company at one point lost over $3 billion in value). His actions have also led regulators in two states to scrutinize his business dealings and settlements to determine whether he has violated “suitability standards.”  Nonetheless, Wynn has asked his 25,000 employees to stand by him and think of him as their father. The question is, will the board stand by him as it faces potential liability for breach of fiduciary duty?

The Wynn board members should take a close look at what happened with the Humane Society yesterday. That board chose to retain the CEO after ending an investigation into harassment allegations. A swift backlash ensued. Major donors threatened to pull funding, causing the CEO to resign. A number of board members also reportedly resigned. However, not all of the board members resigned out of principle. One female director resigned after stating, ” Which red-blooded male hasn’t sexually harassed somebody? … [w]omen should be able to take care of themselves.” Unfortunately, the reaction of this board member did not surprise me. She’s in her 80s and in my twenty years practicing employment law on the defense side, I’ve heard similar sentiments from many (but not all) men and women of that generation. Indeed, French actress Catherine Deneuve initially joined other women in denouncing the #MeToo movement before bowing to public pressure to apologize. We have five generations of people in the workplace now, and as I have explained here, companies need to reexamine the boundaries. What may seem harmless or “normal” for some may be traumatic or legally actionable to someone else. 

As the Wynn and the Humane Society situations illustrate, the sexual harassment issue is now front and center for boards so general counsels need to put the issue on the next board agenda. As I wrote here, boards must scrutinize current executives as well as those they are reviewing as part of their succession planning roles to ensure that the executives have not committed inappropriate conduct. Because definitions differ, companies must clarify the gray areas and ensure everyone knows what’s acceptable and what’s terminable (even if it’s not per se illegal).This means having the head of human resources report to the board that company policies and training don’t just check a box. In fact, board members need to ask about the effectiveness of policies and training in the same way that they ask about training on bribery, money laundering, and other highly regulated compliance areas. Boards as part of their oversight obligation must also ensure that there are no uninvestigated allegations against senior executives. Prudent companies will review the adequacy of investigations into misconduct that were closed prematurely or without corroboration.Companies must spend the time and the money with qualified, credible legal counsel to investigate claims that they may not have taken seriously in the past. Because the #MeToo movement shows no signs of abating, boards need to engage in these uncomfortable, messy conversations. If they don’t, regulators, plaintiffs’ counsel, and shareholders will make sure that they do. 

I previously blogged about a split among the circuits regarding the definition of loss causation for the purposes of a Section 10(b) claim.

To quote one of my prior posts:

All circuits agree that loss causation can be shown via “corrective disclosures” – some kind of explicit communication to the market that prior statements were false, followed by a drop in stock price.

However … there has been an alternative theory that plaintiffs can use to show loss causation, even without an explicit corrective disclosure.  The theory is usually described as “materialization of the risk.” It requires the plaintiff to show that the fraud concealed some condition or problem that, when revealed to the market, caused the stock price to drop, even if the market was not made aware that the losses were due to fraud.  For example, a company may report a slowdown in sales, causing its stock price to fall, while concealing the fact that the slowdown was due to an earlier period of channel stuffing.  By the time the channel stuffing is revealed, it may communicate no new information about the company’s prospects, so the stock price remains unmoved.  Under a materialization of the risk theory, the price drop upon disclosure of the fall in sales would be sufficient to allege loss causation.

To be sure, very often cases fall along something more akin to a spectrum, with district courts demanding more or less of a connection between the disclosure and the underlying fraud before permitting plaintiffs to proceed; nonetheless, the broad guidance offered at the circuit level influences those determinations.  Thus it was significant that, for a time, three circuits – the Fifth, Sixth, and Ninth – were reluctant to recognize “materialization of the risk” theory, and required plaintiffs to clear the more restrictive “corrective disclosure” hurdle. 

In July 2016, as I previously described, the Sixth Circuit joined the majority of circuits and endorsed “materialization of the risk” theory.  That left just the Fifth and the Ninth Circuit on the side of corrective-disclosure-only, with a case then-pending before the Ninth Circuit that directly presented the question.

That decision has just been released.  In Mineworkers’ Pension Scheme, et al v. First Solar Incorporated, et al, the Ninth Circuit, as well, held that “A plaintiff may also prove loss causation by showing that the stock price fell upon the revelation of an earnings miss, even if the market was unaware at the time that fraud had concealed the miss…. This rule makes sense because it is the underlying facts concealed by fraud that affect the stock price.  Fraud simply causes a delay in the revelation of those facts.”

The per curiam opinion stated that the matter had already been resolved by an earlier Ninth Circuit case, which … I, ahem … dispute, but regardless, it’s apparently settled now.

By my count, that leaves the Fifth Circuit standing alone.  Your move, Fifth Circuit.

Earlier this week the SEC announced that it had halted another fraudulent initial coin offering (ICO). AriseBank claimed to have raised about $600 million and that it had purchased an FDIC-insured bank.  AriseBank had promised investors that it would allow them to access FDIC-insured bank accounts and other consumer banking products.  The SEC alleges that these representations were false.  It also alleges that AriseBank omitted to disclose the criminal background of key executives.  A gripping American Banker article has more color on the ICO:

The agency said AriseBank’s initial offering of AriseCoin is illegal because there’s no registration filed with the SEC. It also said the offering materials “use many materially false statements and omissions to induce investment in the ICO,” such as AriseBank’s earlier claim that it had bought a commercial bank and could offer FDIC-insured accounts.

The SEC further said in its complaint that AriseBank “omitted to disclose the criminal background of key executives — most notably, Rice, who is currently on probation for felony theft and tampering with government records.”

This particular initial coin offering also obtained celebrity endorsements.  Most notably, Evander Holyfield endorsed AriseBank through social media. 

 

Celebrities should be careful about endorsing ICOs.  In November, the SEC Division of Enforcement released a statement on Potentially Unlawful Promotion of Initial Coin Offerings and Other Investments by Celebrities and Others.  That statement warned that “endorsements may be unlawful if they do not disclose the nature, source, and amount of any compensation paid, directly or indirectly, by the company in exchange for the endorsement.”  

Although it might be unpopular at times, the SEC’s increased involvement in the ICO space should be a good thing for investors.  By taking some of the frauds out of the market, the SEC may make it easier for honest projects to raise funds.

After spending a little time with the new tax bill, I couldn’t help but think, “there must be a better way.”  That reminded me of an article from a little while back in the West Virginia Law Review, titled, Legislation’s Culture, by Richard K. Neumann, of Hofstra University – School of Law (PDF). Here’s the abstract:

American statutes can seem like labyrinthine mazes when compared to some countries’ legislation. French codes are admired for their intellectual elegance and clarity. Novelists and poets (Stendhal, Valéry) have considered the Code civil to be literature. Swedish legislation might be based on empirical research into problems the legislation is intended to remedy, and the drafting style, though modern today, is descended from an oral tradition of poetic narrative.

Comparing these legislative cultures with our own reveals that the main problem with American legislation is not too many words. It is too many ideas — a high ratio of concepts per legislative goal. When American, French, and Swedish legislatures address similar problems, the French and Swedes draft using far fewer concepts than Americans do. In both countries, simple solutions are preferred over convoluted ones. The drafters of the Code civil thought the highest intellectual and legislative accomplishment to be simplicity. The Swedes got to approximately the same place through a cultural value that law be understandable to the public. Where the American legislative process can seem chaotic, there has been some respect for Cartesian rationality in France and for empirical evidence in Sweden.

Even if American statutes were to be translated into ordinary English, they would still be labyrinths because our legislatures insist on addressing every conceivable detail that legislators can imagine. The result is excessively conceptualized legislation, imposing large numbers of duties. Statutory concepts cost money. They create issues, which must be decided by publicly funded courts and agencies with additional costs to the parties involved. Every unnecessary statutory concept wastes social and economic resources. And to the extent law seems incomprehensible to the public, it loses moral authority.

Having studied law in Louisiana, I admit to a certain soft spot for the civil code, even if my fondness is rooted firmly in this country. (In fact, about one year ago, we lost a giant in the civil law, Athanassios Nicholas “Thanassi” Yiannopoulos.  See, for example, his work, A.N. Yiannopoulos, Requiem for a Civil Code: A Commemorative Essay, 78 TUL. L. REV. 379 (2003), available via Hein Online here.) 

I digress. Back to my point, I think this statement from Neumman is spot on: “[T]o the extent law seems incomprehensible to the public, it loses moral authority.” Absolute truth.  And the same applies to regulations.  

 

 

At The University of Tennessee College of Law, we have a four-credit-hour, four-module course called Representing Enterprises that is one of three capstone course offerings in our Concentration in Business Transactions.  In Representing Enterprises, each course module focuses on a different aspect of transactional business law, often a specific transaction or task.  We try to both ask the enrolled students to apply law that they have learned in other courses (doctrinal and experiential) and also introduce the students to applied practice in areas of law to which they have not or may not yet have been exposed.

I have been teaching the first module over the past few weeks.  We finish up tomorrow.  My module focuses on disclosure regulation.  I have five class meetings, two hours for each meeting, to cover this topic.  Each class engages students with a hypothetical that raises disclosure questions.

The first class focused on general rule identification regarding the applicable laws governing disclosure in connection with the purchase of limited liability membership interests.  Specifically, our client had bought out his fellow members of a member-managed Tennessee limited liability company at a nominal price and without giving them full information about a reality television opportunity our client had with his wife.  As things turned out, the television show was picked up and popularized the brand name of the limited liability company, making the husband and wife, over the next few years, significant income.  Now, of course, the former limited liability company members are contending that, had they known the complete facts, they would have demanded a higher price for their limited liability membership interests from our client.  The students did some nice, creative thinking here in identifying applicable legal rules, pointing to Tennessee limited liability company fiduciary duty law (although they missed our closely held limited liability company doctrine), federal and state securities law, business torts, potential contract law issues, etc.

Subsequent class meetings broke disclosure law down into component pieces commonly seen in a business transactional law context.  The second class centered on work for another client, a Delaware corporation, concerning fiduciary duty disclosure issues under Delaware corporate law in connection with a merger.  The third class focused on a client’s obligations under mandatory disclosure and antifraud elements of the federal securities laws.  The fourth class involved a hypothetical that raises specialized disclosure regulation questions for a talent agency that is an indirect subsidiary of a New York Stock Exchange (“NYSE”) listed company.  I may post later about the fifth class meeting, which will take place tomorrow.  It involves Uber’s recently publicized data security breach and related disclosure matters.

I want to focus today on the fourth class meeting.  In that class, one of the things the students had to wrestle with was determining how the parent’s status and regulation as a NYSE-listed firm might impact or be impacted by disclosure compliance at the subsidiary level.  The NYSE Listed Company Manual provides, e.g., 

202.03 Dealing with Rumors or Unusual Market Activity

The market activity of a company’s securities should be closely watched at a time when consideration is being given to significant corporate matters. If rumors or unusual market activity indicate that information on impending developments has leaked out, a frank and explicit announcement is clearly required. If rumors are in fact false or inaccurate, they should be promptly denied or clarified. A statement to the effect that the company knows of no corporate developments to account for the unusual market activity can have a salutary effect. It is obvious that if such a public statement is contemplated, management should be checked prior to any public comment so as to avoid any embarrassment or potential criticism. If rumors are correct or there are developments, an immediate candid statement to the public as to the state of negotiations or of development of corporate plans in the rumored area must be made directly and openly. Such statements are essential despite the business inconvenience which may be caused and even though the matter may not as yet have been presented to the company’s Board of Directors for consideration. . . .

Having identified this and other related rules, we posited situations in which operations or activities at the subsidiary level might require disclosure by the parent company under the NYSE listed company rules.  We dug in most specifically on what might lead to market rumors or cause unusual market activity.  Having just discussed in the prior class meeting disclosure standards under the federal securities laws, the students understood that materiality was a distinct, separate disclosure-triggering standard and that the parent firm might have different–even conflicting–disclosure obligations under the federal securities laws and the NYSE listed company rules.  With these observations as a foundation, I asked the students what types of conduct or information at the subsidiary level might generate market rumors or unusual market activity.

Given that the firm was a talent agency, I was not surprised when one of the first answers referenced the allegations against Harvey Weinstein.  The disparate pay issues relating to the Mark Wahlberg/Michelle Williams affair that I wrote about in a different context a few weeks ago (w/r/t which the same talent agency advised both actors) also came up.  In each case we tried to envision what the subsidiary should be disclosing to the parent, and when, to enable the parent to satisfy its NYSE obligations.  Among other things, we discussed the financial and non-financial impacts of the facts we were generating on the trading price and volume of parent’s stock.  It was a great brainstorming session, imv.  By the end of class, we could see that a communication-oriented compliance plan for the subsidiary seemed to be in order.

Interestingly, the Steve Wynn story then broke the next day.  I was pleased in the aftermath to see this article in The New York Times that validated the nature of our discussion and the complexity involved in assessing market risk in these kinds of situations.

The question, though, is what specifically investors are now pricing in. One risk is that regulators make it difficult for Wynn Resorts to expand. The Massachusetts gaming watchdog said on Friday that it would review plans for a new casino in Boston.

The threat of parting ways with an influential executive, until now a reasonable steward of shareholder value, is also potent. Over the past decade, Wynn Resorts’ average 10.5 percent shareholder return is a shade higher than that of the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index — despite a slump in 2014 after China toughened rules on holiday gamblers.

Investors’ strong response to the reports is now the problem of Wynn Resorts’ 10-person board, which contains just one woman. Others surely will learn from how the Wynn board responds.

My students did identify regulatory risk (and the rest of the class was spent talking about California and New York laws regulating talent agencies, which are regulated and require licensure) and the risks associated with an iconic founder or chief executive at the heart of a controversy.  I love it when current events dovetail with classroom activities!

Have any of you taught a course or course component like this before?  I would be interested to know.  I found it hard to teach the securities regulation issues to the students who were not interested in securities regulation work.  I tried to break the legal foundations down into relatively small policy and doctrinal chunks, and I told them that every business lawyer needs to know a little bit about securities regulation, whether advising or litigating in connection with business transactions.  But those who had not taken and were not taking our Securities Regulation course (a majority of the class) seemed to mentally almost shut down.  Some of that may be 3L-itis.  But I am rethinking how to engage students more happily with this part of the course.  I will be asking the students for help on this.  But any thoughts you have from your own experience (or otherwise) would be a great help to me as I think this through.