Prof. Dr. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Klaus J. Hopt, MCJ (NYU)

Main Fields of Research

German and European corporate, capital markets, commercial, banking, and business law

Vita

Born 24 August 1940, Tuttlingen, Germany. Studied law, political science, and economics in Munich, Tuebingen, Bilbao, Paris, and New York; 1963 First State Examination in Law (good, one/64); 1965 MCJ New York University; 1967 Dr iur Munich (scl); 1968 Dr phil Tuebingen (mcl); 1969 Second State Examination in Law (very good, one/426); 1973 Habilitation at Munich; teaching qualification (veniae) in civil law, commercial law, German and European economic law, comparative law, sociology of law, and legal informatics.

Professor of law: Tuebingen (1974–78, 1980–85, dean 1982–83); European University Florence (1978–80, head of law department 1979–80); Bern (1985–87); Munich (1987–95); director at the Institute (1995–2008); Hamburg (1996–2008). Appointments offered: 1974 Göttingen and Hamburg, 1978 Frankfurt, 1979 Münster (successor to Professor Schelsky), 1984 Vienna, 1986 Cologne.

Visiting professorships: 1979 U. Pennsylvania, Philadelphia; 1981, 1983 und 1988 European University Florence; 1987 Paris I (Panthéon Sorbonne); 1988 Kyoto; 1989–90 Université Libre De Bruxelles; 1991 Geneva and Tokyo; 1994 Max Rheinstein Visiting Professor, U. Chicago; 1999 NYU Global Faculty; 2002 Harvard U.; 2002–03 Anton Philips Chair, Tilburg; 2003–2005 Paris II (Panthéon-Assas); 2006 NYU Global Faculty; 2007–2008 LUISS Rome; 2008 Lisbon; 2010 Columbia U.; 2013 Vienna and Vienna U. Economics and Business.

Professional activities: Since 1975: International Faculty for Corporate and Capital Market Law, U. Pennsylvania; 1976 reporter, Association of German Jurists; 1976–78 special tutor, German Academic Scholarship Foundation, Tuebingen; 1981–85 judge (lifetime appointment), Higher Regional Court (Oberlandesgericht), Stuttgart (antitrust panel); 1989–1993 special tutor, Cusanuswerk, Munich; 1991–93 Structural and Appointments Committee, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin Law; 1991–2002 Advisory Board, Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research, Mannheim; 1991–94 drafting of proposed stock exchanges act for Bulgaria, commissioned by Bulgaria, the World Bank, and Harvard U. Program on International Financial Systems; 1992–97 head of research, Group Law in Europe project, U. Heidelberg & Fritz Thyssen Foundation; 1992–2002 Advisory Board, FIW [Research Institute for Economic Constitution and Competition], Cologne; 1995–2001 German Takeovers Commission; 1995–2010 Advisory Board, Fritz Thyssen Foundation, Cologne; 1995–2018 Scientific Advisory Board, Deutsches Aktieninstitut [German Securities Institute], Frankfurt; 1997 advisor to Bulgaria on company law reform and harmonization with European law; 1997–2009 Scientific Advisory Committee, Max Planck Institute for Foreign and International Patent, Copyright, and Competition Law (now MPI for Innovation and Competition), Munich; 1998 Chairman, Max Planck Society Presidential Committee on Max Planck Institute for Patent Law; 2000–12 Deputation Committee, Association of German Jurists; 2001–02 High Level Group of Company Law Experts advising the European Commission, Brussels; 2002 commercial law section chair (shareholder protection), 64th Association of German Jurists convention, Berlin; 2002 inaugural fellow, European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI); 2002–08 Vice President of the German Research Foundation [Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft – DFG]; 2002–12 Stock Exchange Expert Commission, German Federal Ministry of Finance; 2002–07 Takeover Commission, German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority [BaFin]; 2003–11 senator, Max Planck Society; 2003–06 chairman, Scientific Advisory Board, Max Planck Society; 2003–05 Supervisory Board, Deutsche Börse AG; 2004 pensions section vice chair, 65th Association of German Jurists convention, Bonn; 2005–11 board of European Corporate Governance Institute, Brussels; 2006–10 Scientific Evaluation Board, Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Berlin; 2007–15 Supervisory Board, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf [UKE]; 2009 evaluation of Faculty of Law, U. Vienna; 2008 commercial law section chair (law of listed issuers), 67th Association of German Jurists convention, Erfurt; 2010 public and private economic law section chair (financial market regulation), 68th Association of German Jurists convention, Berlin; 2011–14 International Advisory Board, Alexander von Humboldt Foundation; 2012 commercial law section vice chair (corporate governance), 69th Association of German Jurists convention, Munich; 2012–present: Working Group on Financial Market Regulation, German Federal Ministry of Finance [BMF]; 2013 search committee (successor to Professor Paul Davies), Allen & Overy Professorship of Corporate Law, U. Oxford; 2013–14 Chairman of the Working Group on Amending the Statutes of the DFG; 2019–present: Scientific Committee, Italian Association of Non-executive and Independent Directors (nedcommunity), Milan; 2020–2023 Scientific Advisory Board, Hamburg U.; 2021–present: Advisory Board, Corporate Governance Institute [CGI], Frankfurt School of Finance & Mgm’t.

Consultant to bodies including the German Bundestag (law, commerce, finance, transportation, housing and construction committees), the German Federal Constitutional Court, various German government ministries (finance, justice, commerce), the German Central Bank, the European Commission, the Bank for International Settlements, Bulgaria, and the World Bank; legal advisor (with resulting publications in parentheses) to bodies including the Federal Ministry of Finance (1996 Deregulierung des Börsenrechts [Deregulation of stock exchanges], 2002 Prospekt- und Kapitalmarktinformationshaftung [Liability for contents of prospectus and information disseminated in capital markets), the Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection (1997–98 Verbandsklage und Gruppenklage [Class actions and joinder of multiple plaintiffs]; 2007–08 Mediation in Europa und der Welt [Mediation in Europe and abroad]), the Federal Constitutional Court (Zustellung der US-amerikanischen class actions [Service of process for class actions filed in the United States), the European Commission (2007–08 European Foundation); main reporter, International Academy of Comparative Law, Washington (2010 Comparative Corporate Governance).

Academy memberships: German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina (Halle; since 2008); International Academy of Comparative Law (The Hague); New Society of Letters at Lund (Sweden); Full member (released of duties) of the Academy of Sciences in Hamburg; Corresponding member of the Braunschweigische Wissenschaftliche Gesellschaft.

Honorary doctorates: 1997 Dr iur hc, Université Libre De Bruxelles; 1997 Dr iur hc, Université catholique de Louvain; 2000 Dr iur hc, Université Paris Descartes; 2007 Dr iur hc, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens; 2010 Dr hc, Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University.

Awards: 1968 Law Faculty Prize, Munich; 2000 Carl Friedrich Gauß Medal, Scientific Association of Brunswick; 2008 Award for Mentorship, Claussen Simon Stiftung; 2008 APTISSIMI Prize, ESADE Barcelona Alumni Law Club; 2009 German Federal Cross of Merit (First Class); 2010 Medal of Honour, Bucerius Law School, Hamburg; 2013 Dr Günther Buch Prize; 2018 Dr Otto Schmidt Prize.

Festschrifts: 2008 festschrift occasioned by going emeritus: “Perspektiven des Wirtschaftsrechts”, Berlin (de Gruyter), x + 526 pp.; 2010 festschrift occasioned by 70th birthday: “Unternehmen, Markt und Verantwortung”, Berlin/New York (de Gruyter), 2 vol., xxix + 3447 pp.; 2020 Festschrift occasioned by 80th birthday, Berlin/Boston (De Gruyter) 2020, xviii + 1592 pp.; 2020 Klaus J. Hopt, “Beiträge der ‘Ehemaligen’ aus 50 Jahren Lehrtätigkeit zum 80. Geburtstag von Professor Klaus J. Hopt”, Salzhausen, 124 p.

Publications in celebration of: 60th birthday, RabelsZ [The Rabel Journal of Comparative and International Private Law] 64 (2000) issue 3; ZGR [Journal for Business and Corporate Law] 2001 issue 3; International and Comparative Corporate Law Journal 2000, issue 4; for 65th birthday, WM 2005 issue 33; ECFR [European Company and Financial Law Review] vol. 3 (2006) no. 2.

Symposia in celebration of: 2000 U. Mainz; 2005 Humboldt U.; 2006 Hopt & Eisenberg Symposium Tokyo/Kyoto; 2015 U. Tuebingen.

Biographical entries: Grundmann, in: Grundmann/Riesenhuber, eds. Deutschsprachige Zivilrechtslehrer des 20. Jahrhunderts in Berichten ihrer Schüler, vol. 2, Berlin (De Gruyter) 2010, pp. 221–259; Grundmann, in: Grundmann/Riesenhuber, eds., Private Law Development in Context: German Private Law and Scholarship in the 20th Century, Cambridge (Intersentia) 2018, pp. 571–609; see also Hommelhoff, ZGR 2016 issue 1, p. 1 and ECFR vol. 2 (2016), p. 375; Ferrarini, in: Hopt, Le banche nel mercato dei capitali, Giuristi stranieri di oggi, Milano 1995, pp. vii et seq.; Horsmans, Revue pratique des sociétés 96 (1997) 297 et seq.; Kühne, in: Braunschweigische Wissenschaftliche Gesellschaft, Jahrbuch 2000, Brunswick (Cramer) 2001, pp. 159 et seq.; Baum/Grundmann/Haar/Mülbert/Wellenhofer-Klein and Schön, in ECFR vol. 3 (2006) no. 2, pp. 121, 122–123; Mülbert, NZG  vol. 24 (2010), p. 935; Grundmann et al., in: Festschrift, supra, 2010, pp. xxv–xxix; Mülbert 24 NZG [Neue Zeitschrift für Gesellschaftsrecht] 946 (2020).

Former students in Germany: Peter O. Mülbert, full professor, Mainz; Stefan Grundmann, full professor, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin; Hanno Merkt, full professor, Freiburg; Marina Wellenhofer-Klein, full professor, Frankfurt; Brigitte Haar, full professor, Frankfurt, deceased; Harald Baum, professor, Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law, Hamburg; Thomas von Hippel, private lecturer & judge in Hamburg; Jan von Hein, full professor, Freiburg; Markus Roth, full professor, Marburg; Heike Schweitzer, full professor, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, deceased; Christoph Kumpan, professor, Bucerius Law School, Hamburg; Patrick C. Leyens, full professor, Bremen and Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam; Wolf-Georg Ringe, full professor, Hamburg; Andreas M. Fleckner, professor, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin.

Former students abroad: Katharina Pistor, professor, Columbia U.; Dimitris Tzouganatos, professor, Athens; Georgios Triantafyllakis, professor, Democritus University of Thrace; Katrin Deckert, maître de conférences, Université Paris Nanterre; Felix Steffek, professor, U. Cambridge; Li-Jiuan Chen-Rabich, professor, Tamkang U., New Taipei City.

Number of doctoral students supervised: 125 (for details, see 2020 festschrift occasioned by 80th birthday, pp. 1559–1568).