Tim Smith – “The Lion of Responsible Investing”
Tim Smith, who began his career in the early 1970s at the Interfaith Center for Corporate Responsibility (ICCR) – has retired from the Boston Trust Walden Company at year-end 2022, where he’d worked for over 20 years. But - great news, and no big surprise to us - in...
The Outlook For 2023 AGMs: Our Tips To Assure A Smooth Event… That You Won’t Find Anywhere Else
The vast majority of companies that had virtual-only meetings last year are sticking to them, so demand will be high for the most desirable dates and times. Reserve your preferred date and time slot early – and be sure you have lined up a top Inspector of Elections...
“Pro-Life” Bullies with Bullhorns Are Set to Disrupt AGMs This Season…If They Can
Three “Pro-Life- Activists” who sneaked in and blended in by posing as ‘backstage workers’ at a private meeting venue managed to literally get behind the curtains at a recent Meeting of Shareholders and to burst out behind the company officers on the dais shouting...
Disruption In The Proxy Solicitation Space: League Tables Tell Part Of The Tale – But Many Big Firms Seem To Be “Remaking Themselves” Or “Lost In A Sea Of Rivals” These Days
One-time upstart Okapi Partners has been ranked as the number-one activist proxy solicitor, both in the U.S. and globally in 2022 - for the fourth year in a row - in Bloomberg’s Global Activism Market Review, below. We hasten to point out, as we always do, that the...
2022 Unclaimed Property Year-End Round Up
The OPTIMIZER’s Riskiest Internal Control Issue of All! BY JENNIFER BORDEN, ESQ. BORDEN CONSULTING GROUP Multi-year audits and litigation are now the norm, whereas prompt payment to owners is not. The unclaimed property (“UP”) landscape over the last year has been...
While We Are At It, Has Your Company’s Inspector Of Election Been “Duly Appointed?” And Is It Clear To You – And To Your Inspector – Exactly What The “Duties Of The Inspector” Actually Are?
Here is our own model template for the Inspectors Final Report on the Voting that has been widely used and adapted to changing circumstances over the years, but where a few ”slips” have slipped in at many companies whose own forms we review when our IOEs are newly...
Is Your “Oath Of The Inspector” Properly Drafted? And Properly Executed? Maybe Not!
Recently, Wendy Shiba - a former law professor and the former Corporate Secretary of three NYSE listed companies - and one of our many superstar Inspectors - emailed to point out an unusual quirk in California’s Corporate Code: The code was amended back in 2014 to...
21 Issuers Named And Shamed For Providing No Time To Vote
Governance guru Jim McRitchie’s post on his Corp.Gov.com website - with his review of a survey on 31 virtual annual meeting practices conducted by the Interfaith Center for Corporate Responsibility - was amplified considerably by a John Jenkins post on...
One Big Bad Day In August As Activist Investors Strike In Force
August 16th was a mighty bad day for three big companies - with big WSJ headlines announcing “Cardinal Health Under Pressure” as activist investor Elliott Management seeks “a handful of seats on the board,” in an effort to jumpstart the stock price…”Third Point Buys...
COVID-Era Snafus Create A Spate Of Mighty Big Lawsuits
But Wait! Shocking Deficiencies In Internal Controls Are Set To Fuel Even More, We Guarantee Over the past three months your editor-in-chief has had three assignments as an expert witness/expert consultant - all involving big stock market losses - and all with the...
