White Paper No. 1, 2007

The Law of Corporate Finance in Europe - an Essay

The rights and duties of shareholders must be reconstructed, must be understood and defined anew in the light of their function as financers of the undertaking. The shareholder’s voting right does not serve to express the position of an individual member of an association. Shareholders only have voting rights because they have a residual claim rather than a fixed right to receive interest, as in the case of creditors.