Edmund-Philipp Schuster

This course is available on the LLM (extended part-time), LLM (full-time) and University of Pennsylvania Law School LLM Visiting Students. This course is available with permission as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit. This course uses controlled access as part of the course selection process. For information on controlled access courses, including eligibility, application processes, deadlines, and departmental contact details, please refer to the Controlled Access Courses webpage.

How to apply: Priority will be given initially to LLM and MSc Regulation students on a first-come-first-served allocation.

Spaces permitting, requests from all other students will be processed on the same first-come-first-served allocation from 10am on Thursday 1 October 2026

By submitting an application, students are confirming that they meet any pre-requisites specified. Providing an additional written statement will not aid a student's chances of being accepted onto a course, and statements are not read.

Deadline for application: Not applicable

For queries contact: Law.llm@lse.ac.uk

This course has a limited number of places and demand is typically high. This may mean that you’re not able to get a place on this course.

LL4G8 – Law of Corporate Finance examines the private law rules that govern how companies raise, deploy, and return finance. Corporate finance law sits at the intersection of company law, contract, and securities regulation, and it shapes how firms fund their operations, allocate risk between providers of capital, and protect creditors and minority investors. The course equips students with the doctrinal grounding and analytical tools needed to navigate this body of law in practice, while situating the rules within their economic and comparative context.

The course opens with an introduction to the basic finance concepts necessary for understanding the legal rules that follow, including the time value of money, accounting basics, risk and return, capital structure, and the distinction between debt and equity claims. The course then turns to the legal architecture of share capital: the rules on initial legal capital, the rules on capital maintenance, as well as alternative creditor-protection mechanisms. Building on this, the course examines the legal regulation of distributions to shareholders (dividends, share buy-backs, and capital reductions), examining the legal constraints on returning value to investors.

The course then turns to equity finance and the mechanics of raising capital: the legal rules governing share issuances, pre-emption rights, and the regulation of public offers of shares. The final part of the course addresses the integrity of the markets in which securities are issued and traded, examining the law on insider dealing and market manipulation, including the rationales for prohibiting these forms of conduct.

20 hours of seminars in the Autumn Term.

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Autumn Term.

Students will have the opportunity to write a formative essay. All students are strongly encouraged to write at least one essay.

Gower, Principles of Modern Company Law, 11th edn, 2021; Eilis Ferran and Look Chan Ho, Principles of Corporate Finance Law, 2014, Eva Micheler, Interests in Securities, 2007.

Exam (100%), duration: 150 Minutes in the Spring exam period.