Note:You may want to open regedit and export the HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\ and HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12\ keys prior to testing this in case you need to revert them!
*Highly recommended*
Please give one of these a try depending on your version eg 2013/2016 and 32 or 64 build assuming they were installed to the default locations...Have only tested the 2013 32 bit one in a VM so I'm unsure of the others! ~ The x64 entries ones are a bit more likely to fail and if so if someone could share the exported key I can likely correct it. :-/
Changes are essentially removing the ddeexec key and changing the /dde at the end of all of them to "%1" to prevent usage of the dynamic data exchange parts which seem to cause the error and just pass the file path instead.
Just save the appropriate one to a text file, rename to .reg and then add to the registry.
Excel 2013 (x86)
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\ddeexec]
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Office\\Office15\\EXCEL.EXE\" \"%1\""
"command"=hex(7):7a,00,71,00,50,00,5e,00,56,00,35,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,\
21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,4d,00,4b,00,4b,00,53,00,6b,00,45,00,58,00,43,\
00,45,00,4c,00,46,00,69,00,6c,00,65,00,73,00,3e,00,6c,00,56,00,57,00,41,00,\
28,00,54,00,56,00,6b,00,4d,00,41,00,49,00,53,00,35,00,44,00,68,00,5d,00,33,\
00,6e,00,56,00,4f,00,20,00,22,00,25,00,31,00,22,00,00,00,00,00
[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12\shell\Open\ddeexec]
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12\shell\Open\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Office\\Office15\\EXCEL.EXE\" \"%1\""
"command"=hex(7):7a,00,71,00,50,00,5e,00,56,00,35,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,\
21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,4d,00,4b,00,4b,00,53,00,6b,00,45,00,58,00,43,\
00,45,00,4c,00,46,00,69,00,6c,00,65,00,73,00,3e,00,6c,00,56,00,57,00,41,00,\
28,00,54,00,56,00,6b,00,4d,00,41,00,49,00,53,00,35,00,44,00,68,00,5d,00,33,\
00,6e,00,56,00,4f,00,20,00,22,00,25,00,31,00,22,00,00,00,00,00
Excel 2013 (x64)
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\ddeexec]
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Office15\\EXCEL.EXE\" \"%1\""
"command"=hex(7):7a,00,71,00,50,00,5e,00,56,00,35,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,\
21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,4d,00,4b,00,4b,00,53,00,6b,00,45,00,58,00,43,\
00,45,00,4c,00,46,00,69,00,6c,00,65,00,73,00,3e,00,6c,00,56,00,57,00,41,00,\
28,00,54,00,56,00,6b,00,4d,00,41,00,49,00,53,00,35,00,44,00,68,00,5d,00,33,\
00,6e,00,56,00,4f,00,20,00,22,00,25,00,31,00,22,00,00,00,00,00
[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12\shell\Open\ddeexec]
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12\shell\Open\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Office15\\EXCEL.EXE\" \"%1\""
"command"=hex(7):7a,00,71,00,50,00,5e,00,56,00,35,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,\
21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,4d,00,4b,00,4b,00,53,00,6b,00,45,00,58,00,43,\
00,45,00,4c,00,46,00,69,00,6c,00,65,00,73,00,3e,00,6c,00,56,00,57,00,41,00,\
28,00,54,00,56,00,6b,00,4d,00,41,00,49,00,53,00,35,00,44,00,68,00,5d,00,33,\
00,6e,00,56,00,4f,00,20,00,22,00,25,00,31,00,22,00,00,00,00,00
Excel 2016 (x86)
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12\shell\Open\ddeexec]
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12\shell\Open\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Office\\Office16\\EXCEL.EXE\" \"%1\""
"command"=hex(7):7a,00,6e,00,3d,00,42,00,56,00,35,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,\
21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,4d,00,4b,00,4b,00,53,00,6b,00,45,00,58,00,43,\
00,45,00,4c,00,46,00,69,00,6c,00,65,00,73,00,3e,00,3f,00,25,00,38,00,47,00,\
69,00,63,00,4b,00,63,00,76,00,39,00,6f,00,49,00,60,00,6b,00,77,00,24,00,3d,\
00,5b,00,55,00,5b,00,20,00,22,00,25,00,31,00,22,00,00,00,00,00
[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\ddeexec]
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Office\\Office16\\EXCEL.EXE\" \"%1\""
"command"=hex(7):7a,00,6e,00,3d,00,42,00,56,00,35,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,\
21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,4d,00,4b,00,4b,00,53,00,6b,00,45,00,58,00,43,\
00,45,00,4c,00,46,00,69,00,6c,00,65,00,73,00,3e,00,3f,00,25,00,38,00,47,00,\
69,00,63,00,4b,00,63,00,76,00,39,00,6f,00,49,00,60,00,6b,00,77,00,24,00,3d,\
00,5b,00,55,00,5b,00,20,00,22,00,25,00,31,00,22,00,00,00,00,00
Excel 2016 (x64)
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12\shell\Open\ddeexec]
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12\shell\Open\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Office16\\EXCEL.EXE\" \"%1\""
"command"=hex(7):7a,00,6e,00,3d,00,42,00,56,00,35,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,\
21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,4d,00,4b,00,4b,00,53,00,6b,00,45,00,58,00,43,\
00,45,00,4c,00,46,00,69,00,6c,00,65,00,73,00,3e,00,3f,00,25,00,38,00,47,00,\
69,00,63,00,4b,00,63,00,76,00,39,00,6f,00,49,00,60,00,6b,00,77,00,24,00,3d,\
00,5b,00,55,00,5b,00,20,00,22,00,25,00,31,00,22,00,00,00,00,00
[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\ddeexec]
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Office16\\EXCEL.EXE\" \"%1\""
"command"=hex(7):7a,00,6e,00,3d,00,42,00,56,00,35,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,\
21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,21,00,4d,00,4b,00,4b,00,53,00,6b,00,45,00,58,00,43,\
00,45,00,4c,00,46,00,69,00,6c,00,65,00,73,00,3e,00,3f,00,25,00,38,00,47,00,\
69,00,63,00,4b,00,63,00,76,00,39,00,6f,00,49,00,60,00,6b,00,77,00,24,00,3d,\
00,5b,00,55,00,5b,00,20,00,22,00,25,00,31,00,22,00,00,00,00,00