The Impact of Litigation on Venture Capitalist Reputation

Venture capital contracts give VCs enormous power over entrepreneurs and early equity investors of portfolio companies. A large literature examines how these contractual terms protect VCs against misbehavior by entrepreneurs. But what constrains misbehavior by VCs? We provide the first systematic analysis of legal and non-legal mechanisms that penalize VC misbehavior, even when such misbehavior is formally permitted by contract. We hand-collect a sample of over 177 lawsuits involving venture capitalists. The three most common types of VC-related litigation are: 1) lawsuits filed by entrepreneurs, which most often allege freezeout and transfer of control away from founders; 2) lawsuits filed by early equity investors in startup companies; and 3) lawsuits filed by VCs. Our empirical analysis of the lawsuit data proceeds in two steps. We first estimate an empirical model of the propensity of VCs to get involved in litigation as a function of VC characteristics. We match each venture firm that was involved in litigation to otherwise similar venture firm that was not involved in litigation and find that less reputable VCs are more likely to participate in litigation, as are VCs focusing on early-stage investments, and VCs with larger deal flow. Second, we analyze the relationship between different types of lawsuits and VC fundraising and deal flow. Although plaintiffs lose most VC-related lawsuits, litigation does not go unnoticed: in subsequent years, the involved VCs raise significantly less capital than their peers and invest in fewer deals. The biggest losers are VCs who were defendants in a lawsuit, and especially VCs who were alleged to have expropriated founders.

How Does Law Affect Finance? An Empirical Examination of Tunneling in an Emerging Market

This paper documents that law affects finance in emerging markets through the methods used by controlling shareholders to “tunnel” wealth out of the firm. We find that Bulgarian securities law enabled financial tunneling via dilution and freeze-out tender offers. During the period 1999- 2001, about two-thirds of the 1,040 firms on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange were delisted. Freeze-out tender offers for minority shares averaged about 25% of the shares’ intrinsic value. Bulgarian securities law changes in 2002 made financial tunneling more costly for controlling shareholders. Subsequent increases in stock market valuations and liquidity suggest that controlling shareholders have shifted from financial tunneling to less value-destroying methods, such as transfer pricing, to extract wealth from firms.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/40128/3/wp742.pd

How Does Law Affect Finance? An Empirical Examination of Tunneling in an Emerging Market

This paper documents that law affects finance in emerging markets through the methods used by controlling shareholders to “tunnel” wealth out of the firm. We find that Bulgarian securities law enabled financial tunneling via dilution and freeze-out tender offers. During the period 1999- 2001, about two-thirds of the 1,040 firms on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange were delisted. Freeze-out tender offers for minority shares averaged about 25% of the shares’ intrinsic value. Bulgarian securities law changes in 2002 made financial tunneling more costly for controlling shareholders. Subsequent increases in stock market valuations and liquidity suggest that controlling shareholders have shifted from financial tunneling to less value-destroying methods, such as transfer pricing, to extract wealth from firms.Tunneling, freeze-out, controlling shareholders, appraisal rights, preemptive rights

Теренско истражување во Радовишко поле

Студентите од Факултетот за музичка уметност од Штип, катедрата по етнокореологија имаа прилика неколку дена да истражуваат во етничките предели Радовишко Поле и Радовишки Шоплук. Истажувањата се вршеа во неколку села и тоа: Ињево, Дедино, Ораовица, Козбунар, Јаргулица, Шаинташ, Ново село и тн. Тема на истаржувањата беа народните ора, народните песни, народните инструменти и народните носии. Собраните материјали депонирани се на факултетот и претставуваат база за понатамошни истражувања од областа на етнокореологијата

Incorporation of Defined Quality Attributes into Solutions Based on Service-Oriented Architecture

The shift of the Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) to the\ud Information Technology, its use and implementation enables the feature of having more robust system offered to the Service Industry. This paper will present enhancement efforts to software platform solution with including quality\ud attributes and will describe the design of the Quality Service-Oriented Architecture. A well known branch of the service industry market in the US is the Pest Control Services which should be part of every single physical object in the USA. There are many Service-Oriented Platforms that handle the Pest Control Industry and our target in this article will be to describe a Quality Oriented and Service-Oriented Design for the Pest Control Industry, which will meet the criteria and the needs of the industry as well to meet all laws requirements to each\ud US state related to the pest control policies and rules. Most important is that the presented software platform provides competitive edge

Can We Quantify the Benefits of IT-Enabled Chronic Disease Management?

The treatment of chronic diseases consumes 86% of U.S. healthcare costs, and yet the U.S. lags in patient outcomes for chronic diseases compared with other industrialized nations that spend far less per capita on healthcare. Initiatives intended to stem the rapid increase in healthcare costs, such as the 2009 Affordable Care Act (ACA), have not resulted in meaningful improvements to population-level health outcomes or to reductions in per capita costs. We build on prior healthcare research to develop an A-B-C framework, which suggests that chronic diseases with the highest potential for disease state management are those with high (A)voidable costs, available (B)iomarkers to monitor the patient’s status, and a strong (C)linical understanding to manage the disease. We apply the framework using data on diabetic patients from the U.S. state of Vermont Blueprint for Health (VBH) initiative, which included a significant implementation of information technology (IT) and data analytics

Variations in semen quality parameters of Ovchepolian pramenka rams according to the method of collection and the meteorological season

The off-breeding season for rams is a time-limiting factor for their use in scientific aims. This research was set upon two aims: (1) to acknowledge the differences of semen quality collected throughout the year, and (2) to investigate which of the two commonly used methods for semen collection (artificial vagina - A.V. and electro ejaculation - E.E.) could prove to be more favorable in the off-breeding period. Five Ovchepolian Pramenka rams were used for this investigation. They were divided in two groups: group 1 (two rams), which was subjected to A.V. method, and group 2 (three rams), which was subjected to E.E. method for semen collection. Semen evaluation included: volume, spermatozoa concentration, live spermatozoa, ejaculate density and motility. According to the season, results have a high statistical significance for the volume (P<0.01) and motility (P<0.001) parameters. Group 1 and 2 results versification showed a high statistical significance for the motility score (P<0.001), ejaculate volume (P<0.01) and percentage of live spermatozoa (P<0.01) parameters. In conclusion, the A.V. method is more favorable for semen collection in late autumn, winter and spring time when rams are out of the breeding season

The selling of put derivatives by firms for shareholder wealth and information signaling enhancement

Working paper; version dated November 5, 200