The fact that a duty of loyalty within the Swedish company law exists should be regarded as indisputable according to the Swedish doctrine, but its content and scope is however more severe identified. As the duty of loyalty is not regulated in the ABL and the fact that there are not many precedents in this area, means that it is difficult to know the boundaries of the company management´s duty of loyalty. It is also unclear whether the company management´s duty of loyalty to the company also is targeting the Shareholders. It is this issue that we intend to discuss in the final chapter of this thesis. In order to answer our questions, we will in chapter two to six give an account of the foundation of the duty of loyalty and thereafter describe the management's duty of loyalty to the company.

Problems: How is the purpose of the swedish limited liability company to increase the wealth of its Shareholders given in swedish corporate law? Based on which legal and economical grounds has this regulation been made? Which problems may occur when the purpose of the company is to maximize the wealth of its Shareholders? Which strategies can be used to prevent the problems that may occur? Should the purpose of the company be to maximize the wealth of its Shareholders? Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate whether a limited liability company primarily shall aim at maximizing the wealth of its Shareholders or not. Delimitations: This thesis only attend swedish limited liability companies. It also only treat swedish corporate law de lege lata. The thesis focus on larger commercial companies which shares are widely spread.

On the 1st of January 2014, new legislation was introduced on taxation of Shareholders in close companies. The legislation has faced criticism from several of the respondents and the purpose of the master?s thesis is to critically examine the legislative amendments made. The base of the thesis is to present the legislation within taxation of Shareholders in close companies, to examine the purposes and motives of the legislator and the criticism received for the legislative amendments, as well as provide a historical perspective of the purpose of the rules. An analysis of the incentives that the legislator is providing Shareholders in close companies, with the amendments, and the extent to which they reflect the purpose of the legislation.

Agency theory describes the conflict of interest between the principal (stockholders) and the agent (CEO). Aligning the incentives of executives with those of the owners is the most direct way to mitigate the agency problem. If there is no meaningful link between CEO compensation and company performance, it is doubtful that the large sums of assets in public corporations are being managed efficiently. In theory the solution is simple reward the CEO when Shareholders wealth increases. The purpose of this paper is to investigate if there is a relationship between company performance and CEO compensation among Swedish companies, in materials and information technology industry.

Agency theory describes the conflict of interest between the principal (stockholders) and the agent (CEO). Aligning the incentives of executives with those of the owners is the most direct way to mitigate the agency problem. If there is no meaningful link between CEO compensation and company performance, it is doubtful that the large sums of assets in public corporations are being managed efficiently. In theory the solution is simple reward the CEO when Shareholders wealth increases. The purpose of this paper is to investigate if there is a relationship between company performance and CEO compensation among Swedish companies, in materials and information technology industry.

Background: To maintain or increase the trust in the market, companies can disclose more voluntary information in the annual reports. According to prior research the annual report is the primary source of information for small Shareholders and investors. Thus, it is of interest to investigate why companies chose to report the voluntary information inquired by this group. Purpose: We investigate some company-specific factors to decide whether these determine the extent of voluntary information, particularly inquired by small Shareholders and investors, in the annual reports of listed Swedish companies. We also aim to discuss underlying causes for our result.

Partner in a close company is taxed under special rules for private companies. This is to avoid a fiscal revenue conversion. Partner as having a major influence in the company and take out what is really earned income as dividends and thus be taxed at a significantly lower rate. The purpose of the close company rules is that a partner in labor income is taxed in the same way that an employee?s income.The problem that arises when one partner in a closely held company leave a Shareholders contribution to the company which aims to raise the threshold for the shares discussed in this paper.

The recent development in several countries? legislation and best practice recommendations in relation to corporate governance in general and audit committees in particular have affected Swedish listed corporations in the form of the Swedish Corporate Governance Code and the coming EU-directive. This paper aims to discover what factors affected Swedish listed companies to form audit committees when this was entirely voluntary. We collected data from the annual reports of 121 Swedish listed companies and formed eleven hypotheses as to what factors we believed affected the voluntary formation of audit committees based on Agency Theory, economies of scale and circumstances specific to the Swedish environment. We then analyzed the data through the use of a multivariate logistic regression model.

We investigate if the size of goodwill compared to total assets has any effect on the Shareholders return on companies listed on the Swedish Stock market. We put up two different hypotheses with a foundation from previous research and later dismiss one of them. Our evidence does not show any indicators that the size of goodwill have an effect on the Shareholders return, which brings us to believe that there, from a share holders point of view, isn?t any need for concern regarding the standards about accounting for goodwill as stated by IFRS. .

Traditionally, it has been argued that companies are only responsible towards their Shareholders, to maximize the profits. But lately it has changed into another way of responsibilty. It has become of great importance to demonstrate sustainable long-term values for stakeholders to identify with. This thesis aims to clarify the banks? definition of responsible investment and what criteria they assume when talking about such kind of investments.

This study examines whether the ownership structure of Swedish firms contributes to explain the variations in executive pay. A regression analysis was performed on 102 companies listed on the Stockholm Stock Exchange. The analysis suggests a negative relationship between ownership structure and executive pay after taking company profitability and size into account. The result is in line with previous studies and the agency theory. This indicates that large Shareholders have a stronger position in Swedish companies or that large Shareholders monitor the management to a larger extent, rather than providing incentives.

Background and problemThe biggest difference between companies and non-profit organizations are their purposes. Companies? purpose is to generate profit to the Shareholders. Non-profit organizations do not have any Shareholders and their purpose is to offer service to receivers of benefits.There are a lot of non-profit organizations today and the competition for the donations is rough. Non-profit organizations can influence the publics? decision of who to support by creating a financial reporting that appeal to the public.PurposeThe purpose of this essay is to examine how non-profit goals are measured in non-profit organizations and if there are a practice on the subject.MethodologyWe choose a qualitative approach as we wanted to understand the reality by explaining it with words.

As a consequence of a turbulent financial market with recurring recessions, the Basel regime was developed, an institutional change with the purpose to create enhanced financial stability through increased capital requirements and increased scrutiny of internal procedures. The Basel regime is an often recurring element in social debates where various aspects are discussed, one of which is whether it maintains its purpose to secure financial stability or whether it is cost effective, and if not, who gets affected by these potential costs.The majority of previously conducted research within this area agrees with the opinion that changes in the regulatory framework within the financial markets, such as the Basel regime, has led to reduced risk of bankruptcy for the banks which has contributed to increased global financial stability. However, research illustrates that these types of changes in the regulatory framework impose a financial burden leading to contradictions in the division of these costs between costumers and Shareholders. This dissertation has been conducted from a Shareholders perspective, out of which the study ?s three hypothesis has been created from.The data in this study is built upon the stock price from the three largest available banks? shares (based on total assets), in the 26 countries which are represented in the Basel committee from (2007) to (2013).

Corporate Social Responsibility is a concept whereby companies integrate social and environmental concerns into their core business and in their interaction with stakeholders on a voluntarily basis. The purpose with our thesis is to study how Swedish insurance companies work with Corporate Social Responsibility and to analyse the underlying strategies of the companies? social, environmental and economical activities. We will analyse where, how and for whom value can be created with CSR. Where does the value creation take place, how can it be created through these activities and who will benefit from Corporate Social Responsibility? Theories point out that companies need to assemble and value the total package of benefits to be able to create successful corporate initiatives.

If an enterprise lacks capital it might be in desperate need of capital contribution to avoid liquidation. One solution to restore the economic balance, is to construct a contract in which the enterprise ensures that capital contribution will be made on given conditions. The purpose with this thesis is to analyze different ways to establish such agreements.A capital contribution can be triggered by a call-off from the board of directors to the contributor, or automatically, when the Shareholders? equity falls below 50 percent of the registered capital stock. In the literature, the latter is represented as the most adaptable.