In-Person-Only AGM constitutes a reckless disregard of covid risk, notes shareholder advocate John Chevedden, regarding Dover Corporation‘s (DOV) decision. U.S. health experts are warning an emerging, highly contagious Covid omicron variant, called BA.2, could soon lead to another uptick in domestic coronavirus cases. Corporate governance continues to evolve. In a letter to the SEC, Mr. Chevedden […]
SEC Staff COVID-19 Guidance was announced, probably at least in part, driven by a Rule14a-8 Coronavirus Letter Marh 11 pdf from the ICCR, US SIF and the Shareholder Rights Group. Guidance discusses virtual meetings, updating the time, date or location of a stockholder meeting and eliminates the federal securities law requirement that such change require […]
Conoco’s virtual only annual meeting is the target of a shareholder proposal by the Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia. A similar proposal was filed at Comcast. The Conoco resolution has already been cofiled by the Church of the Brethren Benefit Trust and the Needmor Fund, a Walden client. As responsible shareholders, we believe good corporate governance […]
Haranguing – A speech addressed to a large public assembly; a popular oration; a loud address to a multitude; in a bad sense, a noisy or pompous speech; declamation; ranting. A speech before a multitude or on the hustings. Once again, the Deal Professor blasts gadflies John Chevedden, James McRitchie and William Steiner – this time for haranguing […]
Town Hall Shareholder Meetings It’s a presidential campaign year here in the U.S., and though the election is still over 6 months away, we’ve already been enlightened (or depressed) by a large number of candidate debates and town halls. Whatever your political views, the candidates seem able to instantly recall policy, financial or data details […]
A message from Jim Kristie, editor and associate publisher of Directors & Boards: Annual meetings can be a frustrating and often futile exercise — in meeting statutory requirements, yes, but not much else as a worthy vehicle for demonstrating corporate leadership and enhancing shareholder relations. Thus, the cover story for the first Directors & Boards […]
As reported earlier (See Protesting Symantec’s All-Virtual Annual Meeting, 22 Sep, 2010) Symantec Corporation set the pathetic precedent of being the first Fortune 500 company to hold a virtual-only annual meeting without shareowner-approved safeguards to protect participant rights. That happened September 20, 2010. But two weeks later, Symantec has backed down. Responding to a letter writing […]
At last, there have been a couple of articles in the national press on the Symantec Corp. virtual-only meeting. First, Ross Kerber reported for Reuters, Shareholder meetings via Web mute dissident voices (9/24/2010) Kerber observed, Soon movies might be the only place to hear pointed outbursts from investors. This year more than a dozen companies […]
Bowing to shareowner concerns, Intel Corp. scrapped plans to hold an exclusively on-line virtual annual meeting in 2010 and is likely to participate in a Fall conference to establish safeguards for the conduct of virtual meetings in the future, the United States Proxy Exchange (USPX) announced today. Background Last Fall, Intel Corp. announced plans to […]
Intel Corp. recently announced they will no longer hold annual shareholder meetings. Instead, they plan to host shareholder forums, or “virtual shareholder meetings.” In 2000, Delaware enacted legislation allowing corporations to do exactly this. Arrogantly, that state’s legislators granted shareholders no say in the matter, leaving the decision solely to the discretion of corporation’s entrenched […]