Family business law

The death of a business owner creates two emergencies: running the company, which must be secured before any division of the estate, and the heirs’ decision whether to accept, as they inherit with the shares the deceased’s guarantees, current accounts and debts. We organise the interim period (estate administrator, provisional management, exercise of the rights attached to jointly held shares), secure the heirs’ option and conduct the settlement of the estate through to its division, amicable or court-ordered, or even through to the sale of the company to a third party, which we handle. We deal with the restoration and reduction of gifts, including where the benefit passed through a company: sale at an undervalue, reserved capital increase, waiver of a current account.

When the couple’s assets have financed, guaranteed or carried the business, winding up the matrimonial regime requires characterising the shares and their capital gains, calculating the reimbursements and claims between spouses, and valuing the company at the relevant date. We assist either spouse in the liquidation and division, in setting the compensatory allowance where the assets are mainly business assets, and in changing the matrimonial regime, including when creditors object.

Insolvency proceedings opened against an entrepreneur or his company reach his spouse and family: jointly owned assets seized in the proceedings, guarantees called, gifts and changes of matrimonial regime challenged as made during the suspect period or in fraud of creditors. We assert before the court and the supervising judge the rights of the spouse, the heirs and the joint owners, and draw the line between personal and business assets. Our insolvency practice, acting for debtors as well as court-appointed officers, gives us an understanding of both sides.

Passing on or dividing assets that include a business comes at a tax cost that often determines whether the parties can agree. We quantify and secure gift and inheritance taxes, the Dutreil commitment regime and the deferred and instalment payment of duties, as well as partition duty and the treatment of equalisation payments. We deal with the taxation of capital gains on shares that are gifted, contributed, sold or divided, including under tax deferral or rollover, and with the situation of heirs or assets located abroad. We assist our clients in audits of the declared value of shares, through to litigation.

The same difficulties can be prevented. We structure the transfer of the business and the protection of the spouse before a crisis: adjustment of the matrimonial regime, gifts and gift-divisions of shares, post-mortem mandate. As fiduciary lawyers, we use the French fiducie to organise a transfer or to place a disputed asset in the custody of an independent third party.