Suchergebnisse für Autonomie

Finanzmarktaufsicht zwischen Macht und Ohnmacht

FINMA has been under constant criticism since its inception; the disappearance of Credit Suisse has only added fuel to the fire. The case of FINMA’s attempted enforcement of a capital surcharge –…

Konzernorganisationsrecht heute

The Swiss law of groups of companies is characterized by a scarcity of statutory rules, judicial pragmatism, and a flexible application of the rules by companies. Unusually, the density of statutory rules in this domain has decreased in recent years. In this article, the author summarizes the current status of the organizational law of groups of companies and takes a closer look at selected…

Absage einzelner Traktanden einer GV oder einer GV insgesamt

Mit Schreiben vom 6. Mai 2020 lud der Verwaltungsrat (VR) der A AG (Beklagte, Beschwerdeführerin, nachfolgend: A AG) die Aktionäre zur ordentlichen Generalversammlung (GV) auf den 18. Juni 2020 ein…

Kantonalbanken im Spannungsfeld von Political Governance und Corporate Governance

Like the other banks, the cantonal banks are facing the challenges of increasing regulation, digitalisation and the persistently low interest rate environment, and are exposed to the accompanying competitive and margin pressure. They have to virtually reinvent their business models and themselves in order to secure their positions as future-oriented financial service providers in their regions…

Relative Marktmacht – gerichtliche Sicht

The amendment 2021 of the Swiss Federal Act on Cartels and other Restraints of Competition provides in the new article 4 section 2^bis a concretizing definition of market power as follows: “An undertaking with relative market power is an undertaking on which other undertakings are dependent for the supply of or demand for goods or services in such a way that there are no adequate and reasonable…

Nichtfinanzielle Berichterstattung nach dem Gegenvorschlag zur Konzernverantwortungsinitiative und ihre Bedeutung für den Finanzsektor

The financial market and its players play a key role in the pursuit of a sustainable economic system. If capital flows are specifically directed toward sustainable products and services, financial market participants can make a significant contribution to a resource-efficient economy. A key prerequisite for the regulatory control of the achievement of sustainability goals is the reporting of…

Ruhen der Stimmrechte und positive Beschlussfeststellungsklage

Die A. AG (Gesellschaft, Beklagte, Beschwerdeführerin) ist eine Aktiengesellschaft nach Schweizer Recht. Das Aktienkapital beträgt CHF 150 000 und ist eingeteilt in 150 Namenaktien zu je CHF 1000…

Salärgovernance und neues Aktienrecht

In determining the compensation of directors and top management, the board of directors of public companies is faced with a structural conflict of interest. The aim to mitigate this conflict through an appropriate design of the procedure forms the essence of the say-on-pay rules introduced by the Swiss electorate in a public vote in 2013 and implemented on a transitional basis in the Ordinance…

Vergütungstransparenz in Schweizer Aktiengesellschaften

Die B. AG ist eine Holdinggesellschaft mit einem Aktienkapital von CHF 600 000, welches in 600 000 Namenaktien mit einem Nennwert von je CHF 1 eingeteilt ist. Die Geschwister A.A., C.A. und D.A. sind…

Editorial

Gesellschaftsrecht lebt von Innovationen und bringt selbst Innovationen hervor. Die Aufhebung der Sachübernahmevorschriften – trotz Herausforderungen in der praktischen Handhabung – war im Zuge der …

Corporate Governance et liberté d’organisation

The question of limits to contractual freedom in corporate law is intensively discussed in connection with corporate governance. In that context, the tension between authority and accountability of the board of directors and the best way to address this issue in corporate law are two of the most controversial topics. Over these last years, the trend in almost all jurisdictions has been to…

Die unechte Konventionalstrafe bei Nichtausübung des Kaufsrechts an einem Grundstück

A1. bis A7. sind die sieben Erben der verstorbenen A8. und A9., die B. SA eine Aktiengesellschaft mit Sitz in X.² Mit öffentlich beurkundetem Vertrag vom 20. Juni 2011 räumten die Erben der B. SA ein…

Editorial

Das europäische Datenschutzrecht ist seit mehreren Jahren in Bewegung: Im Mai 2016 hat die EU die Datenschutzgrundverordnung (DSGVO) vorgelegt, die einen einheitlichen Rechtsrahmen für das…

Datenportabilität und ihre Umsetzung

The right to data portability will be introduced, as a first for Switzerland, with the revised Swiss Data Protection Act. Inspired by the GDPR but with a “Swiss finish”, data subjects may (if certain conditions are met) request the controller to transfer “their” personal data to them or another controller. However, a number of questions remain open, for example: Which type of data is subject to…

«Open Banking» in der Schweiz – Herausforderungen an den Schnittstellen von Finanzmarkt-, Datenschutz- und Kartellrecht

«Open Banking» challenges traditional financial institutions in Switzerland and around the world. It poses strategic as well as legal compliance challenges. The present study delimits the (sometimes synonymously used) terms «Open Banking» and «API Banking» to the effect that Open Banking presupposes an access to the banking account (XS2A) on the basis of non-discriminatory criteria. It thus…

Editorial

Das Gesellschaftsrecht lebt: Die Aktienrechtsrevision ist abgeschlossen, doch ist nach der Revision vor der Revision. Bereits absehbar sind weitere Diskussionen um die Loyalitätsaktien, die aus der…

Les clauses statutaires relatives au transfert des actions de la société anonyme

This article deals with the admissibility of statutory acquisition clauses with regard to the right of the free transmissibility of shares (Art. 685 ss of the Swiss Code of Obligations, CO) and the prohibition of additional obligations at shareholders’s cost (Art. 680 CO). In order to resolve this issue, a distinction must be made between statutory acquisition clauses relating to the shares of…

Schutzzweck der Inhaltskontrolle von allgemeinen Geschäftsbedingungen

This article examines the reason for and justification of controlling the content of general terms and conditions by the legislator and the courts. Based on various individual and institutional protection concepts, it analyzes what the purpose of such content control can and actually should be. This contribution uses a legal theo­ry and law and economics research approach. The results of the…

Automatisierte Entscheidungen: Grundfragen aus der Perspektive des Privatrechts

Data protection law addresses the issue that more and more (complex) decisions are taken automatically. A closer look at the regulatory approaches of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the Council of Europe’s Convention 108 and the draft Swiss Federal Act on Data Protection (draft FADP) leads to two conclusions. On the one hand, the scope of application of these provisions is too…

Haftung für automatisierte Entscheidungen – Herausforderungen in der Praxis

It is now technically possible for decisions to be made by autonomous means without any human involvement. The ability of automated decision making systems to act increasingly autonomously poses new challenges to the current legal framework. For example, in addition to contractual and non-contractual liability bases, proposals are being made for liability under the Swiss Product Liability Act or…

Der Kundenschutz und die FINMA – heute und morgen

To effectively protect financial market clients, an integrated approach combining prudential and conduct supervision is most conducive to achieving the desired results. It has already been applied in principles-based Swiss financial market regulation and supervision and is practised in a risk-oriented manner. Besides public financial market law, further aspects such as civil law and criminal law…

Stärkung der Ombudsstelle

With the coming into force of the Financial Services Act (FinSA) and the Financial Institutions Act (FinIA), the ombudsman will be strengthened by being regulated by law and by obliging the financial…

Das Finanzmarktaufsichtsrecht vom vierten Quartal 2018 bis ins vierte Quartal 2019

Die «Eidgenössische Finanzmarktaufsicht (FINMA)»¹ wurde auf den 1. Januar 2009 aus der Taufe gehoben² bei widrigen Umständen. Die Grossbank UBS war in Schieflage und einer ihrer ehemaligen Top-Manager Präsident der FINMA. Die neue Behörde war zunächst bloss formell neu, weil sie aus drei Vorgängerbehörden geformt wurde: Eidgenössische Bankenkommission (EBK), Bundesamt für Privatversicherungen …

Negativzinsen bei Darlehen

Am 20. Juli 2006 schlossen die Genfer Gemeinde A. (Darlehensnehmerin) und die L. AG (ursprüngliche Darlehensgeberin) einen mit «Schuldschein» bezeichneten Vertrag, wonach die ursprüngliche…

L’[in]effectivité du secret professionnel – Peut-on protéger le produit du travail du service juridique dans les procédures?

The protection of the legal department’s work product is closely linked to the professional privilege of in-house counsels. Such a privilege exists in the United States and many European countries but is non-existent, respectively non-effective in Switzerland. After the abandonment in 2010 of a new federal law aimed at regulating the in-house counsels status and inter alia granting them such a…

Rétrocessions et gestion déloyale

L’ATF 144 IV 294 rendu en été 2018 par la Cour de droit pénal du Tribunal fédéral sonne probablement le glas d’une rémunération du gérant sous la forme de rétributions et rétrocessions versées par…

Das FIDLEG-Prospektrecht ante portas – Guter Anlegerschutz?

The new Financial Services Act (FinSA) will introduce Switzerland’s first comprehensive prospectus regime. While conceptually modeled after the European Union’s Prospectus Directive and its recent replacement, the Prospectus Regulation, the new Swiss prospectus regime employs traditional Swiss legislation techniques and, constructively, abstains from specifically regulating every detail. The…

Sanktionen

Access to the EU Single Market has always been a key concern of Swiss financial market policy. However, in the aftermath of the crisis, the EU has considerably tightened its third country regime by requiring a demonstration of «equivalent regulatory and supervisory frameworks». Given that the EU has recently implemented tougher sanctions throughout its Single Rulebook, obtaining favorable …

Führen die neuen Technologien zur Disruption der Finanzmarktregulierung?

Technological developments and respective changes in business models require adaptations of the financial regulations. The need to adopt risk-oriented rules has become apparent already some time ago. Recently, regulators acknowledged the desirability of introducing innovation-supporting rules (for FinTech enterprises). The most disruptive effects, however, come from the new distributed ledger…

Die Regelung von Interessenkonflikten im Aktienrecht de lege lata und de lege ferenda

Conflicts of interest are a threat to the functioning of the board of directors and the management of a public limited company. This paper looks into the legal regime applicable in cases of a conflict of interest while dealing with third parties. It then tries to establish rules to safeguard an internal decision-making process solving conflicts of interest. Finally it assesses the effectiveness…

Europareport

Mit Urteil vom 19. April 2018 hat der Gerichtshof der Europäischen Union («EuGH») in der Rechtssache C-525/16 mehr Klarheit zu dem Tatbestandsmerkmal «Benachteiligung im Wettbewerb» im Sinne des Art. 102 AEUV geschaffen.

Gerichtliche Durchsetzung der Informationsrechte nach Art. 715a OR

Mit Gesuch vom 29. Juni 2016 stellte A. (Gesuchsteller und Beschwerdeführer) als Verwaltungsrat der B. AG (Gesuchs- und Beschwerdegegnerin) beim Kantonsgerichtspräsidium Obwalden unter anderem das…

Propositions pour un trust suisse

New voices, including in Parliament, are now calling for the adoption of the trust as an institution of Swiss law. This would provide Swiss residents with a much-needed vehicle for estate planning and structuring. It would also improve the legal certainty and robustness of very common business transactions. Notably it would allow lawyers, notaries and other professionals to protect their clients’…

Ausdehnung der Tragweite statutarischer Schiedsklauseln bei Kapitalgesellschaften

Der in Deutschland domizilierte A. (Kläger) gründete im Jahr 2004 mit dem heute in der Schweiz wohnhaften B. (Beklagter) und C. die D. GmbH mit Sitz in T., Schweiz. In Art. 26 der Statuten wurde eine…

Die virtuelle Generalversammlung

On November 23, 2016, the Federal Council published its proposal for a revised law on companies limited by shares. This article deals with the virtual general assembly, one of the key aspects in the pursued modernisation of the general assembly in the context of the proposed revision. First, it addresses the proposed amendments regarding the virtual general assembly. Second, the article analyzes…

Vertrauen im Finanzmarktrecht aus öffentlich-rechtlicher Sicht

Legitimate expectations play a major role in Swiss Administrative Law. The protection of legitimate expectations is a constitutional right and therefore, applies to all areas of Swiss Administrative Law. The Swiss Finan­cial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) may create such expectations by administrative acts, rulings and its various forms of communication. FINMA is conceivably bound to its…

Das Finanzmarktaufsichtsrecht vom vierten Quartal 2016 bis ins vierte Quartal 2017

Als Ausgangspunkt der Finanzkrise gilt gemeinhin der 9. August 2007, als die französische Bank BNP Paribas die Rücknahme von Anteilen an Investmentfonds aussetzte, die im US-Subprime Markt engagiert waren.¹ In der Folge profilierten sich die Notenbanken als unabdingbare Stützen des Finanzsystems.² Die Finanzkrise löste eine gigantische Regulierungswelle aus, die bis heute nicht gänzlich…

Salär-Governance

2017 was a special year for Swiss listed companies. Several compensation reports met fierce resistance from shareholders and proxy advisors, and in one case, a binding vote on executive compensation was rejected. The 2017 proxy season has shown that shareholders do not appreciate compensation models in which osten­sibly pay and performance are not related. Also, the season has shown that over…

Leuchttürme oder Untiefen?

Sometimes, courts must remain silent for many years on important questions, simply for lack of cases, until we find ourselves suddenly confronted with unexpected decisions. This happened with the possibilities corporations had to deal in their by-laws with blockage situa­tions in the shareholder meeting. The Federal Tribunal overturned last year a decades old rule enabling companies to attribute…

Sacheinlage- und Sachübernahmevertrag

The contribution in kind agreement is a contract not specifically classified in the Swiss Code of Obligations (CO). According to the prevailing legal opinion the contribution in kind agreement has to be interpreted in line with contractual instead of company law principles. It is widely recognised that the contribution in kind agreement has a close affiliation with the contract of exchange. Based…

Vorbereitung und Durchsetzung von Aktionärsklagen: Wie kann die Informationsasymmetrie überwunden werden?

In order to improve the enforcement of directors’ liability in solvent companies, it is necessary to improve the access of shareholders to information in order to prepare a derivative suit. The Swiss company law revision project of 2016 provides such improvements by lowering the conditions under which a special audit can be appointed by the court (art. 697a seq. CO). However, the applicants…

Ermessen und Ermessenskontrolle in Revision und Revisionsaufsicht

Judgement is of vital importance in the world of accounting and auditing. With a view to auditing, judgement is the auditor’s leeway in decision-making conferred upon by regulation and standards formulated in an open way. But the exercise of judgement is not at the auditor’s exclusive discretion; it has to be exercised with professional due care, which is conditioned by the observance of the…

Réflexions critiques sur l’adoption par la Suisse des normes du GAFI en ­matière de transparence des sociétés : du bricolage législatif à l’abolition des actions au porteur ?

As a result of the revised FATF recommendations issued in 2012, Switzerland, under international pressure, had no choice but to enact requirements aiming at creating more transparency with regard to the ownership and control of limited by share companies. In this context, the widespread possibility for Swiss companies to issue bearer shares was particularly at stake. Switzerland inserted these…

Le droit bancaire privé suisse 2015 / Das schweizerische Bankprivatrecht 2015

Cette chronique paraît six mois après la précédente (RSDA 2015 386) et figurera désormais chaque année dans le 2^e cahier de notre Revue. On aurait pu espérer que cette livraison-ci s’en…

Konzernorganisationsrecht 2.0

The premise of this article is that the law of corporate groups is, in essence, business organisation law. The departure point is the observation that the function of the corporate group relates primarily to the overcoming of entrepreneurial problems that economic globalisation has brought, and continues to bring, forth. In order to do justice to this economic reality, the law must provide the…

Europareport

Mit Urteilen vom 16. Dezember 2015 (Rs. T-9/11 u.a.) hat das Gericht der Europäischen Union (nachfolgend auch: «EuG») den Beschluss der Europäischen Kommission im so genannten Luftfracht-Kartellverfahren für nichtig erklärt, soweit er das jeweils klagende Unternehmen betraf.

Wettbewerb zwischen internationalen Standards

Competition between different standards can bring about efficiencies but the financial crisis has shown that the coordination and partial harmonization of these standards has advantages that are not to be underestimated. The following contribution analyses the possible competition of standards with a view towards the actors and the recipients of regulation. The theore­tical approach is clarified…

Das Finanzmarktaufsichtsrecht Mitte 2014 bis ins vierte Quartal 2015

«Jedes Modell stösst an seine Grenzen»: Unter diesem Titel hat der FINMA-Direktor anlässlich der Jahresmedienkonferenz der Behörde vom 31. März 2015 «die allgemeine Modellgläubigkeit in der Bankenbranche» diagnostiziert.¹ Statt noch mehr und komplexere Modelle wünscht er sich «weniger und einfachere Modelle». Angesichts des Umstandes, dass interne Modelle zur Berechnung der…

Montesquieu en droit des sociétés anonymes : le principe de la parité constitue-t-il une distribution des pouvoirs bénéfiques ou plutôt un lit de Procuste ?

The current system of distribution of powers is governed by the “parity principle”, which provides that a defined number of powers are vested exclusively with the board of directors. The board is responsible for the accomplishment of these “inalienable” powers, the shareholders may not give any instructions or guidance to the board in this respect. The principle suffers only very few exceptions…

Gleichstellung – Ein aktienrechtliches Thema

Article 734e of the Preliminary Draft demands that each gender is represented with at least 30% of the members of the board of directors and the executive committee of large listed companies. Companies that do not comply with this obligation must describe the reasons for such failure and the measures they will take to advance the underrepresented gender in their compensation reports. Although the…