Inspectors Of Election: More Important Than Ever With VSMs
Since the very first VSM hit the airwaves the OPTIMIZER has been advising that the Inspector of Elections should be playing a key role - mainly because, with everything taking place in cyberspace, investors really need some added assurances that all of the voting is...
Information Agents: Everything You Need To Know… Except For The Really Important Stuff?
The OPTIMIZER editors - and other professional “Wall-Street-Watchers” too - are always avid watchers of the “tombstones” that describe the terms of newly proposed Mergers and Acquisitions - and especially those “Offers to Purchase for Cash” - in newspapers of record...
SEC Fines Transfer Agent VStock Transfer LLC For Numerous Violations; Sets Conditions For A Compliance Consultant To Audit, Report, Recommend And Followup On Remedial Actions
The SEC’s August 27th Release institutes a Cease and Desist Order on a virtual kitchen-sink of violations, including failure to transfer and turn securities around within required time frames, failure to report their failures to do so, failures to properly safeguard...
A Few Notes On The Second Proxy Contest Conducted As A Virtual-Only Event… And On The Use Of A “Universal Ballot”
The OPTIMIZER’s sister-company, CT Hagberg LLC, provided the Independent Inspector of Election in September at what we believe was the second Virtual-Only proxy contest to date, at a small bank in the Midwest. Three of the bank’s investors, with roughly 30% of the...
The Five Best VSMs To Review – And To Learn From… The Most Noteworthy Feature Of The Very Best VSMs? Women!
A month or so ago we suddenly realized that a feature that made the best VSMs so special had gone totally unremarked. So we emailed a little preview of the article we intended to write in this issue to our great friends at TheCorporateCounsel.net. “Here’s another...
Real-Time Voting At AGMs – The Peskiest – And The Stupidest Issue At VSMs – Plus… Our Own Suggested Workaround
As public companies have learned to their dismay and consternation this year, a “Virtual-Only” Meeting of Shareholders requires issuers - and the service suppliers they utilize - to give both registered and street-name holders the ability to cast their votes in...
Plan For A VSM – Or – For A “Stringently Limited In-Person Meeting” In 2021… Now
It’s October 2020, and the chances that public companies will be able to responsibly host in-person Shareholder Meetings any time before October 2021 are virtually ZERO - unless in-person attendance can be strictly rationed to include only the most essential...
A History of the Corporate Governance Movement – As Illustrated by OPTIMIZER Magazine Cover Art – from 1997-2008
We have been promising ourselves we’d do this lookback for several years now - partly to show off some of our favorite covers, by our amazing cover-artist Guy Dorian, who did our first full-color cover in 1999 and every one since - but mainly because the covers...
More Fascinating Materials for the Evelyn Y. Davis File
Following the article for our History File on the notorious EYD, a good friend and former colleague, Stan Siekierski of AST - who is, we believe, the longest-serving person in the Stock Transfer business ever - sent us a rare copy of Evelyn’s HIGHLIGHTS AND LOWLIGHTS...
The Virtual Shareholder Meeting Q&A – and How to Tackle It
The most troublesome issues at 2020 VSMs - by far - have revolved around the Question and Answer Period: Just as we had warned, many activist investors took pains to submit questions - both in advance, via an e-mail to the company’s Investor-Page - or by typing into a...
