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Arbitrators and arbiters are both types of judges but they act in different contexts. An arbitrator judges only in arbitration proceedings. An arbiter has the power to decide in any sort of controversy. An arbitration proceeding is a form of alternative dispute resolution which is held outside of court. Arbitrage is completely different; it is the simultaneous purchase and sale of securities or currencies in two different markets, at two different prices in order to profit from price discrepancies.
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More information on the words discussed in the video, including sound files, examples of usage, common mistakes and encyclopaedic information, can be found in TransLegal's Legal English Dictionary.
Hi, I'm Robin. Welcome to TransLegal's lesson of the week.
Today I'm going to try to demystify the confusion between the words arbitrator, arbiter, arbitration and arbitrage.
Let's start with these first two, arbitrator and arbiter. They are both types of judges but they perform in different kinds of forums. So if we start with an arbitrator. An arbitrator is a judge, but only in arbitration procedures. Those are the only forums. What is an arbitration proceeding you may ask. Well it's a kind of alternative dispute resolution, that is where a legal case is taken and settled out of court. And why would you take a case out of court to settle it in an arbitration? It's done for matters of speed. Usually, it's much quicker to settle a case in an arbitration. It is also secret, so companies that have disputes where they have trade secrets that they don't want to come out in open court, they prefer to take their cases in arbitration proceedings and, moreover, the arbitrators often have great expertise in the subject matter. So those are all the reasons why you would take a case to an arbitration held before one arbitrator or a panel of, usually three, arbitrators.
So what is an arbiter? An arbiter is a judge of anything. Could be a judge of morals, of taste, for instance it is often said that Vogue magazine is the arbiter of fashion worldwide or that the Film Censor Board is the arbiter of morals of all of the movies and TV shows that we see. So this is a much more general word. It can also refer to a court. So it is often said that the US Supreme Court is the final arbiter of all legal disputes in the US. So this is a word that we can use in a very general way as opposed to the very specific way in which we use the word arbitrator.
OK, this leaves us with one more thing now. Arbitrage. This is very different than arbitration. Arbitrage is the simultaneous buying and selling of currencies or securities on two different markets in order to try to take advantage of the difference in prices. So for instance, what an arbitrager does, and please note that you can spell this in two different ways, E U R, the French way or just E R, but they're both pronounced arbitrager. An arbitrager will, for instance, buy securities on the London Stock Exchange and almost simultaneously try to sell them on the New York Stock Exchange in order to try to make money by taking advantage of some sort of a small price difference or disparities between the two exchanges.
I hope this has been enlightening for you. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions or comments please enter them below and don't forget all feedback is good feedback so we look forward to hearing from you. Thanks.
Very helpful, especially when you are back in France in the country! University at home, wonderful…
Thanks Robin. As a French translator dealing with legal and judicial documents I always find Translegal’s material very helpful and I am glad I have passed the ILEC a while ago.
On this occasion it could be noted that in French “arbitrage” translates into both “arbitration” and “arbitrage” (which can be very confusing) and “arbitre” also translates into both “arbitrator” and “arbiter” (and also “referee” on a football pitch for instance).
Thank you just so much for such a wonderful and highly educative source for learning Legal English. It’s exciting even, to my mind, too. Robin is really nice, such a distinct speech. Thank you, again.
a spectacular explanation
Gian Pietro
Thank you, Robin. Your explanation is very helpful.
In Russia we have “arbitrazhniy” court but it has nothing in common with English law arbitration, Our A court deals with commercial cases and is an element of the Russian court system. So I will remember not to call it arbitration (to avoid misunerstanding) but a commercial court instead.
I’m so glad that this will keep you from making a potentially confusing mistake, Tatyana.