The claim that lawyers act as gatekeepers or certifiers in financial transactions is widely discussed in the legal literature. There has, however, been little empirical examination of the claim. In this article, we test the hypothesis that law firms have replaced investment banks as the...

One of the primary policy initiatives instituted in response to the Eurozone sovereign debt crisis is a requirement that all Eurozone sovereign bonds issued after January 1, 2013 include provisions referred to as Collective Action Clauses or CACs. These CACs are intended to enable an orderly...

The claim that lawyers act as gatekeepers or certifiers in financial transactions is widely discussed in the legal literature. There has, however, been little empirical examination of the claim. We test the hypothesis that law firms have replaced investment banks as the gatekeepers of the market...