Research project

As part of the continuation of the Max Planck Fellowship, established originally at the Max Planck Institute Luxembourg for International, European and Procedural Law, Professor Pierre-Henri Conac is conducting a research on the “Harmonisation of administrative sanctions and procedures in European Union financial markets law : developing an European model”. The team is based at the newly established Luxembourg Centre for European Law (LCEL) and is composed of Dr. Jacek Dybinski, and doctoral researchers Enrico Sartori and Milena Mitrovic. The research addresses legal questions concerning financial regulation and especially disclosure of financial and non-financial information (ESG) by listed issuers. The object of research of this research group includes in particular enforcement in the field of capital and financial markets. One aspect of the research is to evaluate the effectiveness of administrative sanctions in selected jurisdictions in the European Union and in the United Kingdom, also taking into account the experience in the United States (U.S) and Canada.

Procedural law relating to enforcement is included as well in the research. From a procedural perspective, experiences from the U.S. are of particular interest, e.g. the so-called “securities litigation”, as well as the practice of U.S. courts to substitute (missing) legislation by negotiated settlements – “regulation through litigation” is in fact an often used (but not always questioned) buzzword of the last decade. In Europe, however, national competent authorities are considered to be more suitable guarantors of the public interest than law firms and other profit-oriented operators in the market. However, this approach, which relies heavily on administrative enforcement, raises the issue of compensation of investors’ losses and coordination with private enforcement.