Company Law and Financial Markets »

Klaus Hopt was the Director of the Max Planck Institute for Foreign Private and Private International Law in Hamburg, Germany from 1974 -1995. He has been a Professor in Tuebingen, Florence, Bern, Munich, and a visiting Professor in the University of Pennsylvania, EUI Florence, Paris I / Sorbonne, Kyoto University, Univeriste Libre de Bruxelles, Geneva, Tokyo University, University of Chicago, and New York University. He was a judge at the Court of Appeals of Stuttgart from 1981-1985, and a member of the International Faculty of Corporate and Capital Market Law. He has also been a member of the German Take-over Commission, the Deputation Deutscher Juristentag, the Group of high Level Experts on Company Law, and of the European Commission. He has been an expert for the German Parliament, for various German Ministries, for Bulgaria, and for the World Bank. Eddy Wymeersch is Professor of Commercial Law, University of Ghent, Belgium, where he teaches company law, securities regulation and banking law. He is a consultant to the EC Commission, the World Bank, and the IFC. He is a member of the corporate governance commission of the Brussels Stock Exchange, and Chairman of the Simpler Legislation for the Internal Market working party on the 1st and 2nd directive. He also acts as advisor to the Belgian Government, as a member of the Legislative Branch of the Council of State. He is a member of the Board of the National Bank of Belgium, and the Belgian Corporate Governance Commission. He was Chairman of the Board of Brussels International Airport Company, and adviser on governance issues to several listed Belgian Companies.

In the specially adapted and updated versions of the papers given at the Siena Conference of March 2000, the contributors attempt to investigate the relationship between company law, securities markets and securities regulation, or 'Capital Market Law'. This is an interdisciplinary project, involving scholars and practitioners of law and economics, policy makers, and corporate finance and management specialists from both sides of the Atlantic. It illustrates the increasing competitive pressure under which regulatory systems are developing, driven by market forces and regulatory competition. As markets are increasingly moulding the framework, the question arises to what extent a global regulatory system is being developed. European company law harmonization will increasingly have to take account of these market forces.