Law School Toolbox Podcast Episode 292: Listen and Learn -- The Erie Doctrine (Civ Pro)
Bar Exam Toolbox Podcast Episode 126: Listen and Learn -- The Erie Doctrine
Every day, attorneys act as advisors to parties negotiating and drafting contracts. Among those terms often left to the lawyers are choice-of-law provisions. Which state’s law governs a dispute, in theory, should not...more
On June 6, 2022, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York found that a contractual New York choice-of-law provision precluded a borrower-plaintiff from obtaining summary judgment on a usury claim brought...more
Most of us have heard the expression “Pigs get fat, hogs get slaughtered.” The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit did not slaughter the officials of the lenders in its November 16, 2021 opinion in Hengle...more
Bank partnerships allow banks to offer loans to consumers and businesses by leveraging the resources of non-bank entities. The relationships between banks and their non-bank entity partners have existed for many years. In the...more
Over the last several weeks, two notable cases in federal court challenging certain aspects of the business model of marketplace lending companies headed down separate paths. ...more
A careful parsing of state laws should be done if a lender is relying on a choice of law to avoid states that have criminal usury statutes. On February 27, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York...more
After the U.S. Supreme Court refused to grant review of the Second Circuit's May 2015 decision in Madden v. Midland concerning federal preemption of state usury rates for loans issued by a national bank, the case was remanded...more
Where do marketplace lenders and secondary loan market participants find themselves on the issue of preemption of state usury laws after the June 27 denial of the petition for a writ of certiorari in Madden v. Midland by the...more
On June 27, the United States Supreme Court declined to review the Second Circuit’s decision in Madden v. Midland Funding, LLC, 786 F.3d 246 (2d Cir. 2015). By denying Midland Funding, LLC’s petition for a writ of...more
Although it is reasonably unlikely that other circuit courts will follow the Second Circuit decision, it is uncertain whether application of the Madden case in the Second Circuit will be confined to its facts....more
Capitalizing on the government's position in its brief to the U.S. Supreme Court, Midland Funding filed a supplemental brief in support of its quest to have the justices overturn a Second Circuit Court of Appeals opinion...more
In a disappointing move, the Supreme Court today denied the petition by Midland Funding to hear the case Madden v. Midland Funding. But could the inaction by the Supreme Court be much ado about nothing?...more
The Supreme Court today denied certiorari in Midland Funding v. Madden. Although the denial leaves the Second Circuit's May 2015 decision in place, it does not signal the Supreme Court's view of the correctness of that ruling...more
In an amicus curiae brief, the US Solicitor General recommends that the petition for certiorari in Madden be denied, but agrees that the Second Circuit’s decision is incorrect and emphasizes the importance of banks being able...more
Marketplace loan investors may want to "gather ye discounted Madden loans while ye may," as the Robert Herrick poem reads (taking some fintech license, of course). In the strongest rebuke yet of the U.S. Court of Appeals...more
Judge Gale's opinion last week in Western Sky in State v. Western Sky Financial, LLC, 2015 NCBC 84 has a little bit of everything in it: choice of law, the U.S. Constitution, claims for usury (excessive interest rates) and...more