Employee ownership has a huge potential to improve firm performance, reduce layoffs, improve employee compensation and benefits, boost median household wealth, foster longer median job tenure, and reduce racial and gender wealth gaps. It also has a long history of bipartisan support. The benefits of employee ownership are wasted when too […]
CalPERS Should Adopt IRV for Board Elections. That is the argument Randy Cheek and James McRitchie made in a draft rulemaking petition to the Board in a 9:24 AM email to board@calpers.ca.gov on 9/21/2022 under Government Code section 11340.6. As of the date of this post, the Board has yet to even acknowledge receipt. That feels […]
Majority Voting 2021. Proxy proposals provide powerful tools to hold corporations accountable. YourStake.org is an online petition platform for financial advisors. The combined savings of many citizens make up the majority of investment into big companies. Companies already respond to big investors. Now they will respond to you if you let them know your concerns. Find a financial […]
#ReproReceipts Campaign by UltraViolet highlights hypocrisy and Calls for Accountability at AT&T, Coca Cola, Disney, Nike, Procter & Gamble, and Uber
The SEC protects the 2%. No, I am not writing about the top 2% of America in terms of wealth or income, although there is probably some correlation. I am writing about the 2% of shares that are still registered. While the SEC is protecting shareholders who own that 2% of shares, they are falling […]
Let’s change Vanguard’s political disclosure vote. Our nation’s largest mutual fund voted against all resolutions submitted by shareholders asking for companies to disclose their political spending. Shouldn’t we have the right to know what candidates our investments are supporting? Vanguard’s Political Disclosure Vote Needs Changed Join more than 59,000 American’s who have already petitioned Vanguard to […]
Most companies opposing a shareholder proposal simply rely on an opposition statement, although sometimes they solicit the votes of their largest shareowners. Steris Corporation (NYSE:STE) took it a bit further. Was it cheating? That depends on your perspective. Like a partially inflated football, a partially stuffed ballot can provide the crucial margin needed to win. Proxy Voting […]
I think most Americans have a very limited attention span when it comes to investing, the SEC and especially corporate governance. When I came across SECDisclose.org earlier this week, I was delighted with a series of videos they have uploaded on dark money and with their byline: Because the S.E.C. shouldn’t stand for “S-E-C-RET.” In a few paragraphs below lifted […]
Resolutions Filed at 53 Companies Disclosure of corporate lobbying expenses remain top shareholder proposal topics for 2015, as more than 60 investors have filed proposals with more than 50 companies asking for reports that include federal and state lobbying payments, political contributions and/or payments to trade associations used for lobbying and payments to any tax-exempt […]
I was delighted to see the influential trade publication, Pensions&Investments, endorse a petition to the SEC sent by the Council of Institutional Investors to amend its rules to allow a complete list of board candidates to be included in corporate proxies. (Better Way to Elect Directors, 2/3/2014: subscribe) (more…)
I missed this bit of news until I read it in a 1/28/2014 PIRC Alerts from the UK. Corporate political donations remain a hot topic even though the SEC dropped it from its 2014 priority rulemakings. As I recall, it was the subject of the most proxy proposals last year. (more…)
At Alliant’s annual meeting on July 31st 65% of shares were voted in favor of the ICCR-sponsored proposal on increased transparency on company’s state and federal lobbying activities. That’s an exceptionally high vote for a shareholder-sponsored proposal, today investorsin Alliant Techsystems (ATK) an aerospace and defense contractor and gun manufacturer, voted in favor of a shareholder request for […]
NYSE Euronext, NIRI (National Investor Relations Institute) and the Society (Society of Corporate Secretaries & Governance Professionals) submitted a joint petition to the SEC requesting the SEC to reduce the time frame under which investors are required to report their holdings from 45 business days after the end of the quarter to two business days after […]
The SEC recently updated its entry in the Office of Management and Budget’s Unified Agenda to indicate that, by April, it plans to issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to require public companies to disclose their spending on politics. This is huge! Perhaps petitions, accompanied by thousands of e-mails from supporters, actually can have an […]
More than $6 billion was spent on this year’s presidential/congressional elections, too much of it by unknown sources. Are your companies opposing candidates you support or supporting those you oppose? If so, do those contributions add to the value of your companies? If they don’t disclose the expenditure, how would you ever know? Sick of […]
The Canadian Society of Corporate Secretaries announces the Shareholder Democracy Summit ─ a Canadian first. CSCS has invited key stakeholders to gather this coming fall on October 24 and 25 in Toronto for an important national summit on shareholder democracy. CSCS President Lynn Beauregard announced today that invitations to register for the Shareholder Democracy Summit […]
A group of ten very prominent corporate and securities law experts submitted a formal rulemaking petition to the SEC last week urging the Commission to develop rules requiring public companies to disclose the use of corporate resources for political activities to shareowners. Please take a few minutes to join with me writing an e-mail to the SEC in […]
The Business Roundtable and Chamber of Commerce made their case and the Court found the SEC rulemaking on proxy access arbitrary and capricious “for having failed once again… to adequately assess the economic effects of a new rule.” The SEC rules certainly didn’t come out the way Les Greenberg and I envisioned when we petitioned […]
In a May 20th petition to the SEC, Ed Durkin of the Carpenters’ Union asks the SEC to eliminate the “withhold authority” voting option by amending Rule 14a-4(b)(2). The well reasoned and well documented 9 page petition includes an attached appendix listing 820 companies that have already adopted a majority vote standard, including (more…)
Thanks to Jesse M. Fried for signing on to our draft petition to the SEC to abolish street name registration. (see also, Co-Filers Wanted on Petition to Eliminate Street Name Registration, 1/13/10 and Street Name Registration: An Antiquated Idea, HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation, 1/30/2010) More important, Fried reminded us that moving […]
According to Investors Against Genocide, proxies issued directly by American Funds met the SEC standard (Rule 14a-4(a)(3) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934) by clearly indicating the vote was about not investing in companies that substantially contribute to genocide. However, according to American Funds, 50 – 60% of its shareholders hold their shares in […]
Webster Named The US Securities and Exchange Commission voted to approve five members of a new national accounting oversight board to be headed by ex-FBI-CIA chief William Webster whose only experience in accounting, as far as we know, was heading the auditing committee of U.S. Technologies, now bankrupt and facing fraud accusations. Shortly before Webster […]