by Natalie J. Keller based on the contribution by Dirk Langner
1. Legal Sources
In very broad terms, commercial law is the special law of merchants. It contains regulations governing their business dealings.
The most extensive regulations in the field of commercial law can be found in the German Commercial Code ( Handelsgesetzbuch – HGB), which consists of 619 sections. As an adjunct to the German Civil Code (Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch – BGB), the Commercial Code contains specific and additional regulations for merchants and businesspersons, which also include trading companies or partnerships, and which, as such, supplement the regulations of general civil law. Applicability of the provisions of the Commercial Code depends on whether the parties involved can be defined as merchants. The primary goal of the Commercial Code is to make the conclusion and execution of commercial dealings easier and faster.
