This Article examines the dilemma of a fiduciary acting for parties who, as among themselves, have conflicting commercial interests—an inquiry fundamentally different from that of the traditional study of conflicts between fiduciaries and their beneficiaries. Existing legal principles do not fully capture this dilemma because agency law focuses primarily on an agent’s duty to a given principal, not on conflicts among principals; trust law focuses primarily on gratuitous transfers; and commercial law generally addresses arm’s length, not fiduciary, relationships. The dilemma has become critically important, however, as defaults increase in the multitude of conflicting securities (e.g., classes of securities of the same issuer having different priorities or sources of payment) that are typical of modern finance. A fiduciary, such as a trustee, acting for investors in these securities faces the difficult task of trying to understand and balance the respective obligations owed to conflicting classes and the risk of being sued no matter how the balancing is performed.
News & Events
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2011 Symposium Webstreaming
Live webstreaming for the 2011 Minnesota Law Review Symposium, Citizens United: Democracy Realized—or Defeated?, will be available at: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/minnesota-law-review-symposium-citizens-united-democracy-realized–or-defeated. Be sure to check it out!
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Article Submission Policy Announcement
On April 19, 2011, the Minnesota Law Review and several peer journals released a joint letter committing to give every author at least seven days to decide whether to accept any offer of publication. Eliminating “exploding offers” will improve the quality of our deliberations and the scholarship that we publish, [...]
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Congratulations!
Class of 2011 Excellence in Public Service Award recipient: Steve Schmidt (vol. 95 Note & Comment Editor); and Class of 2011 Most Outstanding Contribution Award recipient: Chelsea Brennan (vol. 95 Lead Managing Editor). Congratulations Steve and Chelsea!
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2011 Minnesota Law Review Symposium
Citizens United: Democracy Realized—or Defeated?
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