Virtual meeting problems were highlighted in this excerpt from CII’s Weekly Governance Alert Vol 25, Issue 17 | April 30, 2020 by Rosemary Lally. I am reproducing below in order to ensure it gets wider distribution. Virtual meetings, in my experience, have been more problematic when hosted by Computershare than Broadridge but I have had […]
I just registered and booked for Directors Forum 2019. San Diego is a great place to be in January. The 14th annual Forum promises to be the best yet. Will you join us this year? Check out the agenda. Photos from the 2018 event. Here are a couple of my posts from last year’s Forum. (more…)
Lawndale Calls for Improved Governance at Willbros Group Willbros Group – In a filing with the SEC on September 12, 2016, Mill Valley, California-based Lawndale Capital Management, LLC and its affiliates (“Lawndale”) filed a form 13D in Willbros Group (NYSE: WG), reflecting 5% ownership and calling for improvements in the company’s corporate governance policies and […]
Activism is on the rise. When and how can activist shareholders in the boardroom be a force for positive change? Directors need to be prepared. Janet Clark, Darren Novak, Brian L. Shorr, and Andrew Shapiro discuss the issues around strategy and corporate governance at an NACD board leadership conference. (more…)
This is the first time I’ve attended a Council of Institutional Investors (CII) semi-annual conference. As at most conferences, the biggest draw is the ability to network, making new contacts and refreshing old ones. I was delighted to reconnect with Meredith Miller, chief corporate governance officer, UAW Retiree Medical Benefits Trust. I hadn’t seen Meredith since we were […]
Guest Post: Andrew Shapiro is Founder, President and Portfolio Manager of Lawndale Capital Management, an investment advisor that has managed activist hedge funds focused on small- and micro-cap companies for over 21 years, one of the longest periods of experience deploying an activist/relational investment strategy today. The following is a press release from Lawndale. I […]
Has the Council of Institutional Investors (CII) turned over a new leaf or am I only beginning to notice because they recently came out publicly agreeing with me? Three years ago a group of us petitioned the SEC to clarify that the same rules that apply to proxies also apply to voter information forms, VIFs. […]
In light of the IPOs and subsequent performances of Facebook, Groupon, Zynga, etc., there has been renewed discussion in Silicon Valley. When two classes of common stock that place control of the board in the hands of the founders and not the investors, do investors benefit or does it just entrench management? One argument in […]
I received the following from Andrew Shapiro, President, Lawndale Capital Management, LLC yesterday afternoon. This morning, the SEC released and approved final rules relating to Proxy Access. These rules were a bit changed from earlier comment releases and greatly limit practical use of the new rule. The full adoption release (451 pages) can be found […]