France

Abstract This chapter deals with prospectus liability under French law and points out that there is no specific liability regime dedicated to misleading, incomplete, or untruthful prospectuses. Rather, French law builds on general tort liability. Further, in practice there are no known cases where courts build their ruling on prospectus liability. Most cases are based on misinformation of the market, market abuse or insider dealing, and other transparency related wrongdoings. But neither courts nor claimants seem to use specifically invoke prospectus liability. Finally, the evaluation of damages to the investor in these cases is neither easy nor clear or straightforward. Courts tend to either allocate a lump sum per share or apply a random evaluation in order to allocate damages. Overall, French law on prospectus liability lacks maturity. This may be explained by the fact that general tort law is very permissive and there is no need for specific prospectus liability.