The rights of shareholders – basic principle of corporate governance by means of case-specific jurisprudence

Respecting shareholders’ rights represents one of the fundamental principles of corporate governance, underpinning the establishment of economic entities, as a form of association of individuals and / or legal entities in order to carry out profit-oriented activities. However, there are situations in which the management, the other shareholders, or even the authorities, do not respect certain shareholders’ rights, leading to a number of negative effects, such as the closing of companies. Based on these considerations, in this paper, we set as research objective to analyze the circumstances, which may affect shareholders’ rights. To meet the research objectives, we analyzed the case-specific jurisprudence published by the courts of law till 31st of December 2015. The results of the study show that the shareholders’ rights, which are not respected, include: the property right, the right to receive dividends, the right to participate and vote in the general assemblies of shareholders, the right to be elected in the governing bodies, and not the least, the most important one in accounting terms, the right to be informed.