February 06, 2006

The week before last, on Jan. 24, University of Alberta lawprof Moin Yahya addressed a Manhattan Institute lunch crowd in New York to discuss his paper diagnosing a problem with securities class litigation -- namely, cozy relations between class lawyers who sue over stock price drops, and short-sellers who profit from the drop in a stock's price when suit is announced -- along with possible remedies. (See coverage last May 5 on Overlawyered -- "First Sell Short, Then Sue".) On Saturday, Prof. Yahya published a shortened version as a WSJ "Rule of Law" op-ed (sub-only). As before, Larry Ribstein files a dissenting view and Tom Kirkendall joins in as well.