Corporate Governance and Personal Liability of Directors and Managers

Barrocas Advogados & moneris Group meet with wide assortment of entrepreneurs and businesspeople

Jan-Fev | 2010

Last 21 January, the law firm Barrocas Advogados put together a seminar on the themes of corporate governance and the personal liability of directors and managers for acts relating to company management, an event to generate awareness on these important present-day topics, which was attended by the Moneris Group.

The seminar was also attended by the General Secretary of the Swiss Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Portugal, Charles Kaufmann Sampaio, and several dozen business partners and associates from the Swiss, Portuguese/Belgian/Luxembourg, Portuguese/Finnish, Portuguese/Swedish and Portuguese/Dutch Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

Manuel P. Barrocas, founder of Barrocas Advogados – one of Portugal’s oldest and most prestigious law firms – opened the seminar by presenting the themes that would be further elaborated on by Rui Pedro Almeida (Moneris Group CEO and Director) and João Nuno Barrocas (Barrocas Advogados attorney).

Moneris Group CEO Rui Pedro Almeida was given the opportunity to highlight several core issues involving corporate governance in Portugal and the world, specifically with regard to financial reporting in the area of corporate governance. On this topic, the Moneris speaker underscored what he considered to be “a new accounting environment” with the advent of IFRS and Portugal’s accounting standardisation system (SNC), together with the transposition of the Eighth Community Directive and its implications on company oversight. The discussion ended with a list of concrete measures for improvements in financial reporting, essential towards sustainable corporate governance.

João Nuno Barrocas, in his presentation on the civil liability of directors and managers for acts relating to company management, highlighted the fundamental (fiduciary) duties of directors and managers, namely the duties of diligence and loyalty, citing several examples of conduct that may result in liability due to breach of Article 64 of the Portuguese Commercial Companies Code (CSC), and pointing out the main sub-categories of civil liability and holders of protected rights.

The organisers considered this joint action to be a great success, and mutually agreed to hold more events of this sort in the near future.