Professor Samir D. Parikh

Samir D. Parikh's research and writing focus on a variety of business law and bankruptcy issues, including mass tort restructurings, fraudulent transfer law, forum shopping, and municipal distress.

Professor Parikh is a nationally recognized expert on mass tort restructurings and business reorganizations. Cornell Law Review recently selected him as a co-organizer for its 2024 symposium, “Mass Torts Inferno: New Battle Lines in the Resolution Debate.” Last year, The Yale Law Journal Forum published his essay, Opaque Capital and Mass Tort Financing, which spotlights the ways litigation finance companies are distorting resolution in mass tort bankruptcies. University of Pennsylvania Law Review published his article, Financial Disequilibrium, which explores the often-times ruthless world of distressed debt investing. The law review also selected Professor Parikh to be a co-organizer of its 2022 symposium, “Debt Market Complexity: Shadowed Practices and Financial Injustice.” His essay, Creditors Strike Back: The Return of the Cooperation Agreement, further unpacks issues raised in his financial restructuring scholarship and appeared in Duke Law Journal Online.

His article, Scarlet-Lettered Bankruptcy: A Public Benefit Proposal for Mass Tort Villains, is the first to propose a public benefit alternative to traditional resolution mechanisms for mass tort debtors. The article is forthcoming in the Northwestern University Law Review. His essay, Mass Exploitation, was published by the University of Pennsylvania Law Review Online and identifies new practices in mass restructuring cases like Purdue Pharma and Johnson & Johnson. The essay builds on his articles, The New Mass Torts Bargain and Due Process Alignment in Mass Restructurings (with Sergio Campos), which are forthcoming in the Fordham Law Review. These articles’ novel treatment and recommendations served as the basis for the law review’s Spring 2022 Symposium, “Mass Torts Evolve: The Intersection of Aggregate Litigation and Bankruptcy.”

Professor Parikh was recently invited to testify before the Senate Subcommittee on Federal Courts, Oversight, Agency Action, and Federal Rights. On February 8, 2022, he provided a Written Congressional Statement on the hearing topic, “Corporate Efforts to Side-Step Accountability Through Bankruptcy.” He frequently provides expert commentary for national media, including The Wall Street Journal, 60 Minutes (on background), The New York Times, Bloomberg News, NBC News, Law360, The Financial Times, and The Deal.

Professor Parikh’s 2020 article, Bankruptcy Tourism and the European Union’s Corporate Restructuring Quandary: The Cathedral in Another Light, was published in the University of Pennsylvania Journal of International Law and is the culmination of his work as a Fulbright Schuman Scholar at Oxford University. The article was one of eight articles selected to be part of the Oxford Business Law Workshop Series (Trinity Term). His 2017 article, Failing Cities and the Red Queen Phenomenon, 58 B.C. L. Rev. 599 (2017), offers an unprecedented empirical analysis of municipal bond offerings in order to disprove the argument that debt restructuring options increase borrowing costs for cities and counties. A New Fulcrum Point for City Survival, 57 Wm. & Mary L. Rev. 221 (2015), was the winner of the Southeastern Association of Law Schools’ 2015 Call for Papers Competition.

The Harvard Law School Bankruptcy Roundtable has selected all of Professor Parikh’s recent scholarship for distribution to its membership. The Final Report of the American Bankruptcy Institute’s Commission to Study the Reform of Chapter 11 cites his articles in a number of contexts.

In recognition of Professor Parikh’s innovative scholarship, the Fulbright Commission awarded him a 2018-19 Fulbright Schuman Grant. During the first half of 2019, Professor Parikh was a visiting professor at various institutions researching the new EU restructuring framework and its impact on corporations and sovereign nations. Most notably, he was a visiting professor of law at Oxford University. On November 6, 2019, Professor Parikh returned to Oxford to present his work to Oxford’s business law faculty and graduate students.

Professor Parikh is the Editor-in-Chief and an original contributing author for Bloomberg Law Bankruptcy Treatise. He wrote the chapters addressing sections 323, 324, 325, 541, 542, 543, 549, 550, 551, and 552, among others. Further, he is a co-author of the seventh edition of the Examples & Explanations (Bankruptcy and Debtor/Creditor) study guide.

In 2012, Professor Parikh was the sole recipient of the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges Fellowship. The fellowship is awarded to an outstanding bankruptcy scholar as selected by a panel of federal judges, academics, and attorneys.

Professor Parikh has served as a peer reviewer for various law reviews, most recently for the Yale Law Journal and the Harvard Law Review. He currently serves on the Peer Review Board for the Northwestern University Law Review.