Signing Contracts with a Spanish Company

Updated on Thursday 23rd February 2023

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Spain is one of the most attractive European countries for doing business, after its economy has recovered from the deep economic crisis that affected the country in the last years. Foreign investors can benefit from the strategic geographic position of Spain as a gateway for the markets in the south of Europe, Latin America and North Africa. Our team of lawyers in Spain can offer more details on the main reasons for investing in this country.

Legal requirements for Spanish contracts

When starting a business in Spain, foreign investors should know the basic rules for signing contracts in this country, the main tool through which business partnerships are established here.

In order to be recognized under the local legislation, each business contract needs to be signed. The document has to contain specific provisions, including in its signature block, which has to contain the following:

• the signature;

• the name of the person who signs the contract;

• the legal statute of the respective person.

Corporate parties who can sign a Spanish contract

In a company, specific persons are entitled to sign a contract, depending on the type of agreement the legal entity will enter.

This is important in order to establish if a company was legally represented by a certain person, as a company can invoke undue representation, according to the First European Directive on Company Law.

The representatives of a company are to be found in the articles of association of the company and specific documents can only be signed by particular persons, such as the company’s president or chief executive.

There are also other persons who can represent a company through the power of attorney, which can also be granted to our team of Spanish lawyers for a wide range of legal matters available for both corporate bodies and natural persons.

Below, investors can find out more details on how to sign a contract with a Spanish company:

In case of a limited partnership, if the legal entity is represented by another company, the latter should be mentioned in the signatory block, as well as the name of the person who represents it. It is not mandatory to attach to the contract the power of attorney or other documents proving the legal right of representation, but for important contracts, especially when a lawyer is assisting, there are specific documents, such as the power of attorney, that are to be attached to the contract.

The pages of the contracts concluded in Spain are generally initialed, even if this practice is not common in other jurisdictions. The initialing person, who may or may not be the signatory of the contract, will place his/her initial next to the signature of the person or legal entity for which the contract is initialled.

This is also applicable to contracts signed for mergers and acquisitions procedures in Spain. In Spain, commercial contracts are regulated by the Commercial Code, which regulates all the phases of this type of agreement (pre-contractual phase, modifications and others).

Reasons to invest in Spain

Spain has more than 2,400,000 million companies and more than 5,500 foreign companies, being the 14th world’s largest economy. At the same time, Spain is the 29th world economy in terms of gross domestic product per capita and one of the leading economies at the level of the European Union (EU).

Spain is also a good destination for doing business, as presented by the World Bank’s Doing Business Report. Overall, Spain enjoys a favorable business environment, as its “distance to frontier” projections for 2018 reveal a value of 77,02 (out of a maximum of 100). The indicator shows the current state of the economy taking into account various indexes, such as the procedures for starting a business, regulations for investors or the enforcement of contracts.

If you need more details about signing contracts in this country, you may contact our law firm in Spain. Our Spanish lawyers provide legal assistance for concluding business agreements and contracts and they offer a wide range of legal services for foreign and local businessmen.

We invite you to contact our lawyers in Barcelona for more details on the law regulating contract matters. You should know that you can rely on our team for legal representation in litigious cases deriving from various types of commercial contracts.

Our lawyers can offer tailored assistance for your situation and will try to come up with the most favorable solution for your case.

Of course, our law firm can represent clients in business-to-business matters, as well as in business-to-client matters. If you have a business in Madrid or if you live in Madrid and have signed a contract here, please contact us and present your case to our team.

Our lawyers in Madrid will advise you on the most suitable solution and will tell you whether the case can be brought in front of the courts or not.

Additionally, we can offer advice and assistance on cases related to agreements signed for the sale of properties for commercial or residential purposes.

These agreements must contain certain elements in order to be valid and our real estate lawyers in Spain can present what are the main provisions to be included in such documents or when a contract can be considered valid or invalid.