Understanding the Cyprus problem: a small chess piece on a huge board

The island of Cyprus, the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, has witnessed an intermittently-bloody conflict since the latter part of the twentieth century. This island has over the past fifty years turned into a battle ground between the Greek and Turkish ethnic groups. Consequently, hundreds have died and thousands have become refugees and despite various efforts by third-parties, no solution has been achieved to date. This paper examines both the external and internal history of Cyprus and argues that Cyprus has a history of being utilized as a pawn on a larger European chess board and that the present stalemate of Turkey-EU relations has more to do with internal EU politics than with the Cyprus per se

Understanding the Cyprus problem: a small chess piece on a huge board

The island of Cyprus, the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, has witnessed an intermittently-bloody conflict since the latter part of the twentieth century. This island has over the past fifty years turned into a battle ground between the Greek and Turkish ethnic groups. Consequently, hundreds have died and thousands have become refugees and despite various efforts by third-parties, no solution has been achieved to date. This paper examines both the external and internal history of Cyprus and argues that Cyprus has a history of being utilized as a pawn on a larger European chess board and that the present stalemate of Turkey-EU relations has more to do with internal EU politics than with the Cyprus per se

Freedom of Movement Rights of Turkish Nationals in the European Union

This article is concerned with the evolving free movement rights of Turkish nationals in the European Union (‘EU’). The right to move freely represents one of the fundamental freedoms of the internal market, as well as an essential political element of the package of rights linked to the very status of citizenship of the EU. Given the fact that the holding of the nationality of a Member State is the condition sine qua non for acquiring citizenship of the EU, Turkish nationals are clearly not yet citizens of the EU; at best, they can be described as “EU citizens in being.” While the rights granted to Turkish nationals by the EU, are amongst the most extensive granted to third country nationals (‘TCNs’), the outer limits of their freedom of movement rights are firmly rooted in the specific free movement provisions in EU-Turkey Association Law. This naturally gives rise to several inter-related questions: how far should the free movement rights granted to EU nationals be extended to Turkish nationals, as citizens of an accession state? How do the freedom of movement rights of Turkish nationals compare with EU nationals? The freedom of movement rights for Turkish nationals, within the context of Turkey-EU relations, has been an important issue for Turkish citizens ever since 1980 when strict visa requirements were introduced. This problem confronts all strata of Turkish society, including the business community, the academic world, students, journalists, and almost 3 million family members of Turkish nationals living in the EU. This paper shows that the free movement rights of Turkish nationals under EU-Turkey Association law is independent of the political talks surrounding the re-admission agreement and “visa dialogue,” which are aimed at gradually permitting free movement in the EU for Turkish nationals. This paper shows that under the text of the AA, and as confirmed by ECJ case law, Turks have substantial free movement rights within the EU arising from EU-Turkey Association Law and these new agreements and requirements are evidence that the political consideration of the EU block continue to trump the legal considerations

Critical Analysis of Acquitted Conduct Sentencing in the U.S.: "Kafka-esque," "Repugnant," "Uniquely Malevolent" and "Pernicious"?

In federal court and many state courts across the United States, once a defendant is convicted, judges are routinely permitted, and in fact, sometimes required to increase a defendant’s sentence based on relevant conduct, of which he was acquitted at trial, or conduct for which he was never charged. This article highlights the issues that arise from the use of acquitted conduct sentencing under the now advisory U.S. Sentencing Guidelines. The use of acquitted conduct under the relevant conduct provisions of the Guidelines has resulted in substantially longer prison sentences with a disparate impact on racial and ethnic minorities. Acquitted conduct sentencing treats the offense admitted by a defendant, or proven to a judge or jury’s satisfaction beyond a reasonable doubt as only the starting point in calculating a defendant’s sentence; the modified real offense approach, which incorporates relevant conduct and mandates consideration of acquitted conduct, determines the end sentence. This article concludes that use of acquitted conduct should be prohibited both on constitutional and normative grounds. While it is outside the scope of this article to offer a comprehensive solution or alternative to the use of acquitted conduct at sentencing, the key observation is that since the common thread linking the constitutional and normative issues arise from the fragmented nature of U.S. sentencing policy, the solution must start with re-conceptualizing the theories underlying sentencing in the United States

Criticism of the Black-Scholes Model: But Why Is It Still Used? (The Answer Is Simpler than the Formula).

The Black Scholes Model (BSM) is one of the most important concepts in modern financial theory both in terms of approach and applicability. The BSM is considered the standard model for valuing options; a model of price variation over time of financial instruments such as stocks that can, among other things, be used to determine the price of a European call option. However, while the formula has been subject to repeated criticism for its shortcomings, it is still in widespread use. This paper provides a brief overview of BSM, its foundational underpinnings, as well as discusses these shortcomings vis-à-vis alternative models

Criticism of the Black-Scholes Model: But Why Is It Still Used? (The Answer Is Simpler than the Formula).

The Black Scholes Model (BSM) is one of the most important concepts in modern financial theory both in terms of approach and applicability. The BSM is considered the standard model for valuing options; a model of price variation over time of financial instruments such as stocks that can, among other things, be used to determine the price of a European call option. However, while the formula has been subject to repeated criticism for its shortcomings, it is still in widespread use. This paper provides a brief overview of BSM, its foundational underpinnings, as well as discusses these shortcomings vis-à-vis alternative models

Freedom of Movement Rights of Turkish Nationals in the European Union

This article is concerned with the evolving free movement rights of Turkish nationals in the European Union (‘EU’). The right to move freely represents one of the fundamental freedoms of the internal market, as well as an essential political element of the package of rights linked to the very status of citizenship of the EU. Given the fact that the holding of the nationality of a Member State is the condition sine qua non for acquiring citizenship of the EU, Turkish nationals are clearly not yet citizens of the EU; at best, they can be described as “EU citizens in being.” While the rights granted to Turkish nationals by the EU, are amongst the most extensive granted to third country nationals (‘TCNs’), the outer limits of their freedom of movement rights are firmly rooted in the specific free movement provisions in EU-Turkey Association Law. This naturally gives rise to several inter-related questions: how far should the free movement rights granted to EU nationals be extended to Turkish nationals, as citizens of an accession state? How do the freedom of movement rights of Turkish nationals compare with EU nationals? The freedom of movement rights for Turkish nationals, within the context of Turkey-EU relations, has been an important issue for Turkish citizens ever since 1980 when strict visa requirements were introduced. This problem confronts all strata of Turkish society, including the business community, the academic world, students, journalists, and almost 3 million family members of Turkish nationals living in the EU. This paper shows that the free movement rights of Turkish nationals under EU-Turkey Association law is independent of the political talks surrounding the re-admission agreement and “visa dialogue,” which are aimed at gradually permitting free movement in the EU for Turkish nationals. This paper shows that under the text of the AA, and as confirmed by ECJ case law, Turks have substantial free movement rights within the EU arising from EU-Turkey Association Law and these new agreements and requirements are evidence that the political consideration of the EU block continue to trump the legal considerations

Examination of VaR after long term capital management

The 1998 failure of Long-Term Capital Management (‘LTCM’), a very large and prominent Greenwich, Connecticut based hedge fund, is said to have nearly brought down the world financial system. Over the years, few financial debacles such as LTCM, have been so often written about or discussed without a firm conclusion on what went wrong. What brought the “genius” managers of LTCM to their knees? Was it hubris, or was it something more? Various commentators have jumped on LTCM’s significant leverage ratio or engaged in second-guessing of management’s decision in 1997 to return $2.7 billion of investor capital to increase leverage, and thereby, returns. Others have faulted the lack of transparency at LTCM or faulted regulators for a lack of oversight, criticized regulators for arranging the bailout, while others still have pinpointed the debacle on the failure of LTCM’s risk management prowess. This paper avoids the blame and identifies the multiple factors, both management risk management blunders, as well as inherent flaws in the risk metric used by LTCM – Value at Risk (VaR) – a commonly used risk metric in the financial industry today