Revisiting the protection of minority shareholders in company law: EU, comparative and national perspectives
The Department of Law of the University of Cyprus cordially invites you to attend a Conference entitled:
«Revisiting the Protection of Minority Shareholders in Company Law: EU, Comparative and National Perspectives»
Date: Wednesday, 15 October 2025
Time: 09:00 – 16:30
Venue: Amphitheatre B108, University House Anastasios G. Leventis, University Campus, University of Cyprus
The Conference is organized under the auspices of the Cyprus Bar Association.
Protection of minority shareholders is a core subject of company law, but there is no recent international conference examining various EU, comparative and national perspectives on this area. This conference aims at reviewing and assessing various aspects of minority shareholder protection in company law, at examining the influence of EU Law on it, at placing it within the internal market landscape, at drawing insights from influential jurisdictions and at proceeding to thought-provoking comparisons between national company laws. The presentations examine the protection of minority shareholders in order to generate valuable insights about its fundamental mechanisms, to propose solutions to various problems and to reveal new challenges for EU, comparative and national company law and perspectives on reform.
Conference Programme
9:00-9:45 Registration
9:45-10:00 Welcome Address
• Professor Tatiana-Eleni Synodinou, Vice-Rector for Academic Affairs, University of Cyprus.
• Associate Professor Costas Paraskeva, Chair of the Department of Law, University of Cyprus.
• Thomas Papadopoulos, Principal Investigator of the Research Project and Associate Professor at the Department of Law, University of Cyprus.
10:00-10:15 Keynote Address
• Professor Mathias Siems, Professor of Private Law and Market Regulation, European University Institute, Italy.
10:15-11:45 Panel 1: Shareholder activism and efficient exercise of minority shareholder rights
Chair: Giorgos Kazoleas, LL.M., Lawyer, Managing Partner at Legal Experts Cyprus
Speakers:
1)‘The appropriate European mismatch between minority shareholders’ rights and shareholder activism’, Christoph Van der Elst, Professor of Business Law and Economics, Ghent University, Belgium and Tilburg University, Netherlands.
2)‘Minority shareholders enforcing CSR claims: regulatory and private law aspects’, Mariia Domina, Associate Professor of European and Comparative Business Law, University Paris Nanterre, France.
3)‘Protection of minority shareholders in the general meeting: challenging meeting resolutions in comparative law’, Ariel Mucha, Assistant Professor, Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland.
4)‘Rules and principles governing abuse of minority protection rules – a comparative perspective’, Jessica Östberg, Associate Professor, Linköping University, Sweden.
5)‘Capital maintenance, shares and protection of minority shareholders in European company law: minority shareholder activism and corporate dividends’, Georgios Zouridakis, Research Fellow, University of Cyprus, Cyprus; Former Lecturer, University of Essex, UK and Thomas Papadopoulos, Associate Professor of Business Law, University of Cyprus, Cyprus.
11:45-12:15 Coffee Break
12:15-13:30 Panel 2: Protection of minority shareholders in the light of transparency and information
Chair: Stelios A. Triantafyllides, Advocate & Legal Consultant in Cyprus; Partner of the law firm Antis Triantafyllides & Sons LLC, Nicosia, Cyprus; Member of the Committee for Companies and Capital Market of the Cyprus Bar Association.
Speakers:
1)‘Protection of minority shareholders through information and inspection rights concerning management decisions and policies’, Hans De Wulf, Professor of Business Law, Ghent University, Belgium.
2)‘Private international law aspects of the protection of minority shareholders’, Nikitas Hadjimichail, Professor of Private Law, Commercial Law and Private International Law, University of Cyprus, Cyprus.
3)‘Protecting minority shareholders through disclosure in EU company law: the role of business registers following the adoption of Directive (EU) 2025/25’, Corrado Malberti, Associate Professor of Commercial Law, University of Trento, Italy.
4)‘Protection of minority shareholders and related party transactions in EU law’, Ivan Romashchenko, Marie Sklodowska-Curie YUFE Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Cyprus, Cyprus.
13:30-14:30 Lunch Break
14:30-16:15 Panel 3: Protection of minority shareholders in the context of fundamental changes and control mechanisms
Chair: Georgios Zouridakis, Research Fellow, University of Cyprus, Cyprus; Former Lecturer, University of Essex, UK.
Speakers:
1)‘The protection of minority shareholders in cross-border transformations’, Georgios Psaroudakis, Associate Professor of Commercial Law, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece.
2)‘Directive (EU) 2024/2810 of 23 October 2024 on multiple-vote share structures in companies that seek admission to trading of their shares on a multilateral trading facility: harmonisation efforts and corporate governance challenges’, Bénédicte François, Professor of Law, Université Paris-Est, France and Jacques Moury, Professor of Law, Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne, France.
3)‘Delisting of companies and protection of minority shareholders’, Alexandros Seretakis, Assistant Professor of Financial Law, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland.
4)‘Protection of minority shareholders and the mandatory bid rule–The Serbian example’, Jelena Lepetić, Associate Professor, University of Belgrade, Serbia.
5)‘Expropriation through collusive takeovers: evidence from Italy’, Casimiro Nigro, Lecturer in Business Law, University of Leeds, UK and Davide Vitale, PhD Student in Corporate Law, University of Torino, Italy.
6) ‘The general principle of equal treatment of shareholders and the protection of minority shareholders in the EU Takeover Bids Directive’, Thomas Papadopoulos, Associate Professor of Business Law, University of Cyprus, Cyprus.
16:15-16:30 Concluding remarks and discussion
Σημαντικές Πληροφορίες:
- Κόστος συμμετοχής: ΔΩΡΕΑΝ
- Το σεμινάριο είναι μέρος της συνεχιζόμενης επαγγελματικής εκπαίδευσης των δικηγόρων και μοριοδοτείται με 5 μονάδες ΣΕΕ.
- Οι μονάδες θα καταχωρηθούν αυτόματα από τον Π.Δ.Σ. σε όσους παρακολουθήσουν το σεμινάριο στο σύνολό του.
- Γλώσσα διεξαγωγής: Αγγλική
Εγγραφή:
- Η εγγραφή στο σεμινάριο πραγματοποιείται αποκλειστικά μέσω της πλατφόρμας εκπαίδευσης (portal) του Παγκύπριου Δικηγορικού Συλλόγου.
- Θα πρέπει να γίνει σύνδεση πριν την εγγραφή σας ως ΔΙΚΗΓΟΡΟΣ και όχι ΕΠΙΣΚΕΠΤΗΣ.
- Η τελευταία ημερομηνία εγγραφής είναι η Δευτέρα, 13 Οκτωβρίου 2025, και ώρα 23:59.