Shareholder Protection Across Countries – Is the EU on the Right Track?

Anlegerschutz, EU-Recht, EU-Staaten, Investor protection, Community law, EU countries

The End of Comparative Law

Following the 1900 congress in Paris, the beginning of the 20th century saw comparative law emerge as a significant discipline. This paper suggests that the early 21st century is seeing the decline, or maybe even the 'end', of comparative law. In contrast to other claims which see the 21st century as the 'era of comparative law', there are at least four trends which give rise to pessimism: 'the disregard', 'the complexity', 'the simplicity', and 'the irrelevance' of comparative law. These phenomena will be explained in the body of this paper; the concluding part considers suggestions as to how to proceed further.Comparative law, numerical comparative law, legal culture, law and finance, World Bank, harmonisation, convergence, governance.

Legal origins: reconciling law and finance and comparative law

In the last few years law and finance scholars have 'discovered' the usefulness of comparative law. Their studies look at the quantifiable effect that legal rules and their enforcement have on financial development in different countries. Moreover, they link their results with the long- standing distinction between Civil Law and Common Law countries. Whether this revival of 'legal families' is a useful way forward is, however, a matter of debate. The following article challenges these studies and looks for characteristic features which are more precise and meaningful than the use of legal families as such.legal origins, legal families, legal traditions, numerical comparative law, law and finance, law and development, Civil Law, Common Law

Diversity in Shareholder Protection in Common Law Countries

Aktionär, Anlegerschutz, Common Law, Shareholders, Investor protection

Cross-border reincorporations in the European Union: the case for comprehensive harmonisation

Despite recent decisions of the Court of Justice that liberalise inbound and outbound reincorporations, several Member States still prohibit these transactions or make them impossible or impractical. Even where reincorporations are available in principle, significant legal uncertainties often exist due to a lack of clear and interoperable rules. This situation may, for instance, jeopardise the interests of creditors and minority shareholders of the emigrating companies in circumstances where the involved jurisdictions do not provide for an explicit regulation of cross-border reincorporations aimed at protecting these stakeholders. Furthermore, when procedural rules are unclear or lacking, companies might be struck from the relevant register of the country of origin without being entered in the register of any other Member States. We argue that, as a consequence, harmonisation of the reincorporation process is necessary, and that it is desirable to reach a high minimum standard of creditor and minority shareholder protection