Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg Law with June Grosso from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: Robin Hood is facing a barrage of lawsuits by customers
Speaker 1: overclaims it unfairly blocked trading and shares of high flying
Speaker 1: stocks like game Stop, whose share price surge after being
Speaker 1: touted on social media forums. Joining me as commercial trial lawyer.
Speaker 1: David Bissinger, a partner at Bissinger Ashman and Williams are
Speaker 1: these day traders on forums like the Reddit based Wall
Speaker 1: Street bets changing the way the market works. I don't
Speaker 1: know if it's changing the way markets work, but it's
Speaker 1: certainly opening up trading at a level that we've never
Speaker 1: seen before because robin Hood is a commission free UH
Speaker 1: platform in which Robin makes his money and what they
Speaker 1: call payment for order flow UH. In other words, the
Speaker 1: product is really the traders, and robin Hood makes money
Speaker 1: off of the spread between with the buyer of the
Speaker 1: stock pays versus what robin Hood has to pay to
Speaker 1: fill the order UH. And so it's just part of
Speaker 1: an evolution that began, you know, really in the sixties
Speaker 1: and seventies with Charles Schwab and then the elimination of
Speaker 1: fixed commissions and then just the continued reduction and trading
Speaker 1: cost which has characterized Wall Street really for the past
Speaker 1: fifty years. So is the story all about these day
Speaker 1: traders banning together over social media platforms like Reddit's Wall
Speaker 1: Street bets if that's your following, Reddit, I think are
Speaker 1: just part of the story. For example, according to Matt
Speaker 1: Levine on Bloomberg's Money Stuff column, really only a minority
Speaker 1: of the purchases last week of Game Stock stock uh
Speaker 1: were by retail investors. Certainly there's going to be other
Speaker 1: hedge funds uh, And I think it's not well indicated
Speaker 1: or mentioned by the press. That is very likely that
Speaker 1: other institutional traders are on the buy side, uh, Whereas
Speaker 1: the current media frenzy really focuses on the short selling
Speaker 1: hedge fund especially Melvin Capital, which shorts old stock uh.
Speaker 1: You know, however many months ago. So why are the
Speaker 1: hedge funds in it? I think it's probably a mixed bag.
Speaker 1: I mean, for example, the most famous hedge fund that
Speaker 1: is long game Stop stock is Michael Burry, ironically famous
Speaker 1: for shorting the housing market, you know, more than a
Speaker 1: decade ago, as documented by the Christian Bale character in
Speaker 1: the movie the big short UH in this situation, Michael
Speaker 1: Bury started buying game Stop stock I think in the
Speaker 1: third quarter of But what I suspect that once the
Speaker 1: best settled an investigation is conducted, you'll see plenty of
Speaker 1: other hedge funds from to the present UH buying the
Speaker 1: stock as opposed to shorting the stock. Robin Hood has
Speaker 1: been criticized from all sides for restricting trading. So do
Speaker 1: you buy their reason for restricting trading? You know, I
Speaker 1: think there's a good case for it. You know, we
Speaker 1: don't know all of the details. It's really a question
Speaker 1: of whether their rationale that they stated is truthful. But
Speaker 1: there's a good case for it. And the rationale that
Speaker 1: robin Hood gave for stopping trading was they needed to
Speaker 1: ensure that they had adequate net capital. This gets into
Speaker 1: a somewhat esoteric but extremely important question for investors, because
Speaker 1: if robin Hood kept allowing people to drive the stock
Speaker 1: up the Game Stop stock to say a thousand or
Speaker 1: poor more, what you would see is that the net
Speaker 1: capital of robin Hood itself would likely be UH so
Speaker 1: a liquid that it would put robin Hood in jeopardy
Speaker 1: of collapse. Much has happened with like Lehman Brothers and
Speaker 1: other actors in the financial crisis, you know, twelve years ago.
Speaker 1: And so what I think would be ironic would be
Speaker 1: if robin Hood had allowed people to keep trading, and
Speaker 1: then when the bubble inevitably burst, the traders in robin
Speaker 1: Hood buying game Stop stock suddenly would suffer the huge
Speaker 1: losses and by the way, massive margin calls, ruining their lives.
Speaker 1: And then we would see a populoust doubt cry, much
Speaker 1: like the home buyers in the real estate bubble that
Speaker 1: led to the financial crisis of two thousand and eight,
Speaker 1: accusing banks and so forth the predatory lending. Don't forget
Speaker 1: that robin Hood was extending margin to the redditors, the
Speaker 1: supposed redditors trading and buying game stop stocks. So these
Speaker 1: guys buying game Stop stock are not just buying it
Speaker 1: with their own money. They're buying it, you know, on margin,
Speaker 1: with extensions of credit from robin Hood. And the problem is,
Speaker 1: once the traders started accumulating a massive position in house money,
Speaker 1: the margin needs to be ratcheted way way down. And
Speaker 1: so robin Hood certainly had a contractual right. Paragraph sixteen
Speaker 1: of its customer agreement says it can stop trading in
Speaker 1: the stock at any time, and that contractual provision is
Speaker 1: absolutely necessary for any brokerage firm to operate because of
Speaker 1: extreme market volatility events just like this, and robin Hood
Speaker 1: at a certain level. Whether the truth or not here,
Speaker 1: we don't know. There'll be an investigation and we'll find
Speaker 1: out did have to comply with the net capital requirements
Speaker 1: of the Securities and Exchange Commission and the clearing houses
Speaker 1: through which robin Hood trades. Remember that the buyers of
Speaker 1: game Stop stock at robin Hood aren't just buying the
Speaker 1: stock immediately from some other counterparty robin Hood. They're buying
Speaker 1: it through an intermediary called the Depository Trust Corporation d
Speaker 1: t c C. It's a clearing endity, a clearing house,
Speaker 1: and d t c C requires robin Hood to maintain
Speaker 1: adequate net capital, as does the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Speaker 1: So maybe robin Hood's reason for stopping was not truthful
Speaker 1: or accurate, but there's a plausible explanation as to why
Speaker 1: they did it. We'll find out. The SEC has said
Speaker 1: it's closely monitoring the situation. What kind of regulatory problem
Speaker 1: would this be? What's the SEC looking for? Well, I
Speaker 1: think the first thing uh that comes to mind is
Speaker 1: whether or not robin Hood was in fact truthful in
Speaker 1: saying that it's a net capital was in jeopardy. But
Speaker 1: when you look at the massive increase in the stock
Speaker 1: price of game Stop and other of the similar shares
Speaker 1: the reditors were trading in, and the relative newness of
Speaker 1: the platform of robin Hood, and the fact that robin
Speaker 1: Hood did in fact have to, you know, draw down
Speaker 1: from its lines of credit, which you wouldn't have wanted
Speaker 1: to do. I think that the sec will investigate, and
Speaker 1: I'm probably with congressional investigations as well to prepare detailed
Speaker 1: reports whether or not that actually happened. Again, I tend
Speaker 1: to think it did, at least at a certain level.
Speaker 1: Then there's discussion of, you know, how do you regulate
Speaker 1: these new online trading platforms like robin Hood that you know,
Speaker 1: allow a lot more flexible trading than the you know,
Speaker 1: old conventional commission based model. You know, I don't know
Speaker 1: exactly what those regulations would be, but from what I
Speaker 1: see as as securities litigator, I don't see anything here
Speaker 1: that cries out for a radical change in the securities
Speaker 1: regulations we have and it has had for you know,
Speaker 1: nearly a hundred years comparable securities regulations. I mean, even
Speaker 1: before the nine stock market crash, the New York Stock
Speaker 1: Exchange imposed various net capital requirements. They weren't as rigidly
Speaker 1: enforced as after the Securities and Exchange at nineteen thirty four.
Speaker 1: But you know, the wild West of stock trading really
Speaker 1: was in the late nineteenth century, and you know, really
Speaker 1: came to an end well before any of us were born.
Speaker 1: And or Elizabeth Warren called for a broader review by
Speaker 1: the SEC and said, broker dealers that invite individual investors
Speaker 1: need to operate based on basic rules and to keep
Speaker 1: the playing field level. Do you think that's the problem here?
Speaker 1: You know, I'm not even sure what that means. Because
Speaker 1: if you're a trader, well just quite literally, if you
Speaker 1: start out stay with you know, ten thousand dollar trading account,
Speaker 1: you're a small retail investor and you start buying game
Speaker 1: Stop stock. You know, if you started buying it, you know,
Speaker 1: say three or four months ago when it was whatever
Speaker 1: the twenties, uh, and all of a sudden that converts
Speaker 1: into hundreds of thousands of dollars because you've written this
Speaker 1: huge wave and you've been doing that in part on margin. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't know that there's any fundamental right. In fact,
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure that uh, you know, once I think
Speaker 1: Elizabeth one and and the others, and I would say
Speaker 1: this applies equally to some of the right wing uh
Speaker 1: populism on the issue, uh that once people really sit
Speaker 1: down and realize trading in the stock exchange is an
Speaker 1: incredible privilege and it is not something that just is
Speaker 1: it just doesn't happen. In other words, you need market
Speaker 1: infrastructure to allow for the safe training. And again, just
Speaker 1: look back to the credit crisis when the regulations were
Speaker 1: dropped and all of a sudden you have the democratization
Speaker 1: supposedly of real estate finance that led to horrible outcomes
Speaker 1: for you know, small you know, low income and middle
Speaker 1: income uh families, and so you know, I think it
Speaker 1: was a very you know, the provocative issue. And it
Speaker 1: is so much fun to see the big shots, you know,
Speaker 1: get their noses bloodied and uh see the little guys
Speaker 1: purportedly winning. I get that. It's great fun. You read
Speaker 1: the I would invite all of the listeners to subscribe
Speaker 1: to the Reddit sub account called our slash Wall Street
Speaker 1: bets because it's just funny. I mean, it's just silly
Speaker 1: and goofy. But to say that these traders, these retail traders,
Speaker 1: have a fundamental right to drive up the stock way
Speaker 1: beyond any rational you know, corporate valuation of that stock.
Speaker 1: You know, really, I think mistakes. The purpose of the
Speaker 1: stock market is warm, Buffett says. The stock market in
Speaker 1: the short run is a voting machine. You can drive
Speaker 1: the price way up, But in the long run, it's
Speaker 1: a weighing machine. It weighs the long term earnings, the
Speaker 1: long term cash flows of the companies in which the
Speaker 1: stocks are issued. And I don't think anyone seriously believes
Speaker 1: the Game Stop stock is going to sit at you know,
Speaker 1: four hundred dollars for a long time. I mean this morning,
Speaker 1: at least last night checked it was down down, I
Speaker 1: think in the two hundred range. And when you look
Speaker 1: at the company's cash flows and fundamentals, it's just hard
Speaker 1: to believe that it's going to stay there. Maybe this
Speaker 1: short failing hedge fund, Melvin Capital gets wiped out. Uh,
Speaker 1: maybe there's some yet, you know, come up and for
Speaker 1: a certain small group of hedge funds traders in New
Speaker 1: York or whatever. But I mean, I think it would
Speaker 1: be a mistake to assume that the you know, longside,
Speaker 1: the purchasers of game Stop, are entirely these small investors.
Speaker 1: I think it's very much more likely that there's other
Speaker 1: hedge funds quietly behind the scenes, letting the Reddit guys
Speaker 1: take all the publicity while the hedge funds, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: profit from Melvin's misery. Because hedge funds love beating each
Speaker 1: other up, they tear their faces off every day. This
Speaker 1: is just a public example of something that has been
Speaker 1: going on since trading began. There are close to twenty
Speaker 1: lawsuits by investors against robin Hood. What are the suits
Speaker 1: based on? What do they have to prove? Well, the
Speaker 1: lawsuit I have in front of me, it makes the
Speaker 1: mistake of alleging breach of contract, in other words, that
Speaker 1: the investors supposedly had this contractual right to keep trading.
Speaker 1: The lawsuit itself attaches the customer agreement I quoted earlier
Speaker 1: with paragraphs sixteen that says that robin Hood can put
Speaker 1: a trading halt on customer trading basically at its discretion.
Speaker 1: And so it's hard for me to see as a
Speaker 1: commercial litigator, and especially someone who does a lot of
Speaker 1: securities litigation. How that constitutes a breach of contract when
Speaker 1: Robin Hood had the right to stop the trading, especially
Speaker 1: given the market fundamentals. Now, but it turns out that
Speaker 1: Robin Who has engaged in some chicanery. Okay, maybe, but
Speaker 1: I mean Robin Hood, I'm sure did not want to
Speaker 1: stop trading. I mean, they do better by letting their
Speaker 1: customers actually trade. Maybe it's a cabal, Maybe there's a
Speaker 1: secret tact with Robin Hood and Citadel and these other
Speaker 1: people to shut down the small investors. But I think
Speaker 1: that that's you know, gonna be viewed as implausible. People
Speaker 1: step back and realize how the market system actually works. Again,
Speaker 1: it's great fun, it's great, great fun to see these
Speaker 1: guys get beat up, but you've got to really step
Speaker 1: back and look at the market infrastructure. So do you
Speaker 1: think that these lawsuits then won't survive motions to dismiss Well,
Speaker 1: maybe we find out something provocative in that Robin Hood
Speaker 1: did something nefarious and underhanded. But if it's just simply
Speaker 1: the allegation that Robin Hood breached this contract by you know,
Speaker 1: not allowing people to continue to buy game stop, I
Speaker 1: mean the Temple Laws, which for example, says that deprived
Speaker 1: the customers of profitable trading opportunities. That to me seems
Speaker 1: like a real stretch. It's going to be very difficult
Speaker 1: for an investor to claim I had the right to
Speaker 1: make another a hundred thousand dollars and drive game Stop
Speaker 1: stock all the way to five hundred when game Stop
Speaker 1: can come in and say, now we had the right
Speaker 1: to stop this, and by the way, we had a
Speaker 1: good reason for it. Again, maybe there's something out there
Speaker 1: we haven't seen. Much of the facts, you know, by
Speaker 1: necessity haven't been fully ventilated. But I would I would
Speaker 1: find that implausible again, barring some incredible revelations. Also, do
Speaker 1: the robin Hood investors have to submit to arbitration according
Speaker 1: to the contract? Yeah, the contract does include mandatory arbitration.
Speaker 1: Whether or not that actually occurs is going to be interesting,
Speaker 1: because it may well be robin Hood decides to take
Speaker 1: the investors who filed lawsuits up on their desire to
Speaker 1: be in court, which robin Hood would be allowed to do.
Speaker 1: In other words, robin Hood would be able to waive
Speaker 1: the arbitration requirement, get all these cases consolidated in front
Speaker 1: of a judicial panel. On the multi district litigation and
Speaker 1: maybe get rid of the cases that way, because individual
Speaker 1: arbitrations in such a massive context as this might be difficult.
Speaker 1: You know. I think the Bloomberg piece Chris Dalmus wrote that,
Speaker 1: uh we you and I discussed indicates that these lawsuits
Speaker 1: are probably gonna be around for a while. Uh. My
Speaker 1: sense of it is that they'll die slow and painful.
Speaker 1: That why do you think it will be slow because
Speaker 1: of the massive number of lawsuits that investors have filed
Speaker 1: all over the country, which will trigger this multi district
Speaker 1: litigation process. Uh at least that's I think, you know,
Speaker 1: a one view of it. It. It's conceivable Robin Hood
Speaker 1: decides to challenge to these lawsuits individually, uh, in in
Speaker 1: court after court after court. But given the number of
Speaker 1: the lawsuits, it kind of makes sense that uh, they
Speaker 1: would be consolidated for uh you know, pre trial treatment
Speaker 1: before a multi district litigation channel. That's gonna be again
Speaker 1: something we just have to see and how it plays out.
Speaker 1: Uhbin you could also compel these arbitrations. Are compel these
Speaker 1: lawsuits to arbitration. That's another way to handle it. Um.
Speaker 1: But um, you know, I think that the conventional wisdom,
Speaker 1: and a lot of the like law professors and so
Speaker 1: forth and other experts are are probably right that'll will
Speaker 1: be consolidated before the judicial channel and multi district litigation,
Speaker 1: and that just takes additional time. Just explain briefly why
Speaker 1: companies usually prefer arbitration to trial. Well, the conventional wisdom
Speaker 1: is that it avoids runaway juries. Uh and and you
Speaker 1: know that's definitely true in many instances. I will say
Speaker 1: that I'm a little bit more of an agnostic because
Speaker 1: a lot of planets cases do better in arbitration if if,
Speaker 1: for example, there's no depositions and no motion practice or
Speaker 1: at least not much motion practice, and the cases get
Speaker 1: decided and then once they're decided, there's no appeal. Uh
Speaker 1: So I think there's really kind of a you know,
Speaker 1: pros and cons to arbitration versus court. But there's no
Speaker 1: question that in most consumer contracts like this, they do
Speaker 1: contain arbitration. That's very common in the brokerage industry. The
Speaker 1: cases are typically heard by the UH financial industry regulatory
Speaker 1: authorities arbitration UH subsidiary, and that that is viewed as
Speaker 1: generally being favorable to defendants. But you know, there are cases,
Speaker 1: and I've seen them one I've wanted them myself in
Speaker 1: front of center artitrators. So it isn't just a guaranteed
Speaker 1: victory for the defendants. Uh And in some cases there's
Speaker 1: advantages to the planoff investors. Thanks for being on the
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Law Show, Dave. That's David Bissinger of Bissinger, Ashman
Speaker 1: and Williams. The number of Americans getting divorce plummeted last year,
Speaker 1: and the marriage rate also dropped as thousands of weddings
Speaker 1: were postponed or canceled due to the COVID nineteen pandemic.
Speaker 1: This early look at COVID nineteen's effect on divorce and
Speaker 1: marriage statistics comes from Bowling Green State University's Center for
Speaker 1: Family and Demographic Research. The data contradicts earlier predictions that
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen and the stresses of the quarantine would cause
Speaker 1: divorce rates to surge. Joining me as family law attorney,
Speaker 1: Dan lipschelds of Aaronson, Mayefski and Sloan me, how COVID
Speaker 1: affected your divorce practice. Well, I thought there would be
Speaker 1: you know, there was a lot of news around the country,
Speaker 1: around the world that COVID would cause a significant increase
Speaker 1: in divorces. Um. I have not now agur into the
Speaker 1: pandemic seen that obviously when the pandemic first is and
Speaker 1: being a practicier out in New York City, you know,
Speaker 1: we went down in mid March ahead of other parts
Speaker 1: of the country, and courts were closed, and with courts
Speaker 1: being closed and not having the ability to operate virtually
Speaker 1: at that time, things certainly came to a relatively grinding halt.
Speaker 1: But you know, there was talk, as we said at
Speaker 1: that time and over the course of the summer, that
Speaker 1: when things opened back up, there would be a major,
Speaker 1: major uptick in divorce rates. And I can't say that
Speaker 1: that that's happened. I think that as things have opened
Speaker 1: back up, yes, we've seen an inflow of new matters,
Speaker 1: but currently nothing that is significantly greater than prior to
Speaker 1: the pandemic. And to some extent, I think there's a
Speaker 1: certain type of matter that we've seen and there are
Speaker 1: other types of matters that we have not seen, and
Speaker 1: that deals with I think people in certain economic situations
Speaker 1: and socio economic stature of families. I think that you know,
Speaker 1: a lower socioeconomic stature family or a family where one
Speaker 1: or both spouts have lost job. I think the decisions
Speaker 1: to move forward with the divorce has become certainly a
Speaker 1: harder one, given that divorces can involve complicated issues and
Speaker 1: can be expensive, and the you know, there is still
Speaker 1: a significant backlog of cases, even the courts having been
Speaker 1: opened back up and and operating virtually, even some wealthy
Speaker 1: couples are facing some economic uncertainty at this time, and
Speaker 1: uncertainty you know about kids going to school, things like that.
Speaker 1: Does that affect a wealthy couple's decision to get a divorce?
Speaker 1: M I don't think the same extent that uh, it
Speaker 1: might affect a less wealthy tuckle um. I think that
Speaker 1: people who have access to resources, even where there might
Speaker 1: be a slight downturn, are still going to be in
Speaker 1: a position to make that decision. I think economic considerations
Speaker 1: are always important in choosing whether you're going to be
Speaker 1: moving forward with this divorce the separation. But I think
Speaker 1: that the lower income household, that decision has become much
Speaker 1: much harder than in a wealthy household. And there is also,
Speaker 1: as I said, access to court resources or the ability
Speaker 1: to perhaps engage in some type of alternatives resolution, and
Speaker 1: you know, higher a private judge, which is something that
Speaker 1: I have certainly seen in the more affluent families that
Speaker 1: want to move forward with UM a divorce process that
Speaker 1: might otherwise stalled or you know, significantly delayed because of
Speaker 1: the pandemic. As far as getting a divorce case through
Speaker 1: the courts during COVID, were you able to do that
Speaker 1: or were divorces basically stopped for a while in New
Speaker 1: York State UM, and specifically New York City. Uh, they were,
Speaker 1: they were stopped. UM who aren't even able to commence
Speaker 1: an action for divorce for a number of months. I
Speaker 1: think given that the city or Manhattan the words UM
Speaker 1: more of an epicenter than other parts of the state
Speaker 1: and certainly other parts of the country. UM, other parts
Speaker 1: of state began to open up sooner than New York City,
Speaker 1: and then again once things opened back up, UM, it
Speaker 1: didn't necessarily mean that there were in port in person
Speaker 1: court appearances. In my fielden matrimonial law in New York
Speaker 1: County with his Manhattan, there are still no U in
Speaker 1: person proceedings. That it's all virtual, and that has changed
Speaker 1: the manner in which we've been practicing law. You are
Speaker 1: not appearing in court, you're appearing virtually. UM. The filing
Speaker 1: has gone predominantly to electronic filing. And I think that
Speaker 1: has changed the case in which uh you have access
Speaker 1: to the courthouse, UM, the pace in which cases move forward.
Speaker 1: I you know that there are far less trials then
Speaker 1: there were uh pre pandemic. I think we're still adjusting
Speaker 1: to it. UM. In Manhattan, there are you appear before
Speaker 1: a judge, but economic issues in the case can be
Speaker 1: referred out to a special referee, which is sort of
Speaker 1: an under judge. And those childs have not been done yet. UM.
Speaker 1: So you where there was a huge amount of economic
Speaker 1: cases being sized by a with different referees. UM, those
Speaker 1: have not really restarted yet. UM. And And in addition,
Speaker 1: if you don't consent for there to be a trial electronically,
Speaker 1: then you don't have to participate in one. And it
Speaker 1: can certainly so if there's not consent on both sides,
Speaker 1: it can cause further delay. Has COVID changed custody determinations
Speaker 1: in any way? It's the same process, um, in terms
Speaker 1: of you know, how you would adjudicate or you would
Speaker 1: litigate a custody case. UM. I can't say that there's
Speaker 1: been a significant change in how UH COVID has affected that.
Speaker 1: There are certainly, almost on a weekly basis, new issues
Speaker 1: that arise, and I think judges are consistently confronted with um.
Speaker 1: You know, the same type of issue would arise, and
Speaker 1: most judges would do the same one over a course
Speaker 1: of a certain period of time. For example, you know
Speaker 1: what the pandemic UH started, there would be a divorced
Speaker 1: family or even a family going through a divorce process,
Speaker 1: and one pair wants to be inno vacation homes and
Speaker 1: one parent is an essential work they're living in the
Speaker 1: city and and would like the same access to their child.
Speaker 1: But you have quarantine regulations and you see guidelines, and
Speaker 1: so you know, as the pandemic has evolved, there are
Speaker 1: new questions that arrived, but consistent that that you'll see
Speaker 1: judges having to tackle and having to deal with it.
Speaker 1: And it is interesting, which how can to deal with
Speaker 1: those issues because on one hand, you have a court order,
Speaker 1: perhaps a court order document. On the other you have
Speaker 1: a you know, spec guidelines, or you have a recommendation
Speaker 1: from the governor. And certainly I've seen judges give effect
Speaker 1: to their orders unless there is some type of executive
Speaker 1: order or something that would trump that something coming out
Speaker 1: of all THENY for example, I would say that a
Speaker 1: court should operate in this way given a certain set
Speaker 1: of circumstances. But um, there have been a lot of
Speaker 1: interesting UM custody issues because of the pandemic set of quarantining,
Speaker 1: because of families desiring to uh you know, divorce, families
Speaker 1: desiring to one parent with somewhere else, and you know
Speaker 1: the access child and how parenting time is because of
Speaker 1: that you mentioned before private judges explain what that's about.
Speaker 1: So I was touching on sort of alternative dispute resolution, UM,
Speaker 1: which is, you know, it's different way that you can
Speaker 1: approach a litigation. You can go to a mediation, you
Speaker 1: can go to an arbitration. The difference between you know,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry if I'm sort of spoon feeding it, but
Speaker 1: the difference between the mediation and arbitration is you go
Speaker 1: to a mediator who would make a recommendation, but it
Speaker 1: wouldn't be binding, and our a trader would be someone
Speaker 1: who would make a determination. UM that would be binding.
Speaker 1: Now how binding that is uh depends on the type
Speaker 1: of arbitration you're in. But there has certainly been a
Speaker 1: move towards working with either retired judges, older professionals in
Speaker 1: our fields that are respected to assist in the adjudication
Speaker 1: of cases, because, as I talked about before, you may
Speaker 1: not have the same access to a trial, the same
Speaker 1: access to a judge, the same ability to UH have
Speaker 1: a trial as you could if you were coordinating with
Speaker 1: the other side. UM both you know, both litiganst both
Speaker 1: spouses wanting to move forward with the resolution of the
Speaker 1: case and agreeing to utilize UH, you know, somebody that
Speaker 1: you would pay privately to assist in the adjudication of
Speaker 1: your case. And that's what I was referring to, a
Speaker 1: private judge to be somebody that you agree upon with
Speaker 1: the others, I too, basically appoint as an arbiter of
Speaker 1: the issues in their case. And there's different considerations that
Speaker 1: go into that choice as well as to that process.
Speaker 1: And but I have certainly seen a move to that
Speaker 1: UH in the litigation that I'm involved in. UM. I
Speaker 1: think that, you know, touching back to the point of
Speaker 1: the economic UM considerations, people who are in a more
Speaker 1: affluent and wealthy family, I think, have the ability to
Speaker 1: choose to hire somebody like that, whereas somebody in a
Speaker 1: lower socio economic class or a lower income family might
Speaker 1: not have that choice. Um, And so there has been
Speaker 1: a move in some cases to choosing to have your
Speaker 1: matter resolved by uh, somebody that both sides has confidence
Speaker 1: in and connect with the judge. Did they used to
Speaker 1: before COVID have sort of divorce clinics where people who
Speaker 1: have a low income can go and have their divorce
Speaker 1: hashed out. Yes, through the court systems. They they do that. Um.
Speaker 1: There's certainly I think then, UM some delay in those
Speaker 1: UM clinics as they get up to virtual speed um.
Speaker 1: And used to simply be able to go to a
Speaker 1: courthouse or for example, I used to participate in something
Speaker 1: called Monday Night Law, which was a program through the
Speaker 1: New York City Bar where you would spend the evening UM.
Speaker 1: Whether it was judges or or referees are lawyers, and
Speaker 1: people would be able to come and meet with, you know,
Speaker 1: a professional that would help assist them or give them
Speaker 1: some advice, um for free, how to approach a divorce,
Speaker 1: how to deal with certain issues that might arise, and
Speaker 1: that that has not been as quickly off the ground
Speaker 1: or continuing like awards pre pandemic. Thanks for being on
Speaker 1: the Bloomberg Launch Show. That's Dan lip Schultz of Aaronson,
Speaker 1: Maajevski and Sloane And that's it for the edition of
Speaker 1: the Bloomberg Lawn Podcast. I'm June Grasso. Thanks so much
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