Company News

Alliance Trust Press Release

ShareSoc has issued the following press release: Alliance Trust have convened a General Meeting on the 28th February. It includes 4 resolutions covering the change in investment approach and the proposed share buy back of shares held by Elliott. Our recommendation is that shareholders vote "FOR" all the resolutions. ShareSoc is issuing this press release because we understand that some institutional investor advisory services have expressed some concerns about the proposals. The Alliance Trust Shareholder Action Group which has been supported by ShareSoc is satisfied ...

VCT News – Baronsmead, Northern VCTs and Foresight 4

I attended the Annual General Meeting of Baronsmead Venture Trust this week (on 14/2/2017). It was not particularly well attended perhaps because of the early start time of 10.00...

RBS and Shareholder Committees

As readers may be aware, ShareSoc have requisitioned a resolution for the Royal Bank of Scotland's (RBS) Annual General Meeting requiring a Shareholder Committee be appointed. Do they need one? The directors of RBS clearly think not. For those readers who do live or work in London, you may find an article published yesterday (15/2/2017) in the London Evening Standard giving an overview of the major UK banks revealing. The article was written by Simon English and was headlined "End of the ...

High Court Rejects Dee Valley Takeover Challenge

Small water company Dee Valley has been the subject of a bid from Severn Trent Water via a scheme of arrangement. An attempt to block it by those opposed acquiring a block of shares and then distributing them to many supporters (mainly employees we understand) has been rejected by the High Court. In the case of a scheme of arrangement, more than 50% in number of the shareholders have to support the offer, as well as 75% of shareholders by value. In ...

Alliance Trust Voting Recommendations

ShareSoc has issued the following note to supporters of the Alliance Trust Shareholder Action Group: Shareholders in Alliance Trust should have received a Notice of a General Meeting on the 28th February. It includes 4 resolutions covering the change in investment approach and the proposed share buy back of shares held by Elliott. Our recommendation is that shareholders vote "FOR" all the resolutions. The Alliance Trust Shareholder Action Group is satisfied that the new Board of Directors has made good progress in revitalising the ...

Alliance Trust Shareholder Forum

Alliance Trust Shareholder Forum Yesterday (25/1/2017) Alliance Trust Plc (ATS) held the first of three meetings for shareholders to explain the outcome of the "strategic review" undertaken by the board of directors and the future investment management arrangements. This first meeting was in London and attended by a couple of hundred shareholders many of whom posed good questions. More on the questions and answers below, but first let me give you some impression of the mood of the audience and an overview of ...

BT Hit By False Accounts

The share price of BT Plc (BT.A) fell by over 20% yesterday after reporting that it would have to write off £530 million in its accounts as a result of "improper accounting practices" in its Italian subsidiary. That included "improper sales, purchase, factoring and leasing transactions" according to the announcement by the company. BT's CFO Simon Lowth commented that including borrowing against receivables to pay debts, improper sale and leaseback transactions and shifting of operating expenses into capital budgets. The company's ...

Paddy Power Betfair – Same Excuses as William Hill

Bookmaker Paddy Power Betfair (PPB) came up with similar excuses for middling results as did William Hill recently on which I wrote a previous blog post (see https://www.sharesoc.org/blog/company-news/how-bookmakers-lose-money-william-hill/ )....

Rolls-Royce Bribery Settlement – Questions Worth Asking

On the 17th January aero-engine maker Rolls-Royce announced a settlement with the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), US Department of Justice (DoJ) and Brazilian authorities over past bribery and corruption...

How Bookmakers Lose Money – William Hill

William Hill (WMH) issued a trading statement yesterday (9/1/2017) which was effectively a profit warning. They said margins were hit by "unfavourable football and horseracing results". It is one of the longest standing myths in the gambling world that bookmakers can lose money when the favourite horses romp home, or the heavily backed but unexpected football teams win. My grammar school maths teacher taught me how to construct a "book" 50 years ago, so that by setting the odds on all horses ...

New Year Resolutions? How About a New Resolution at RBS?

One of ShareSoc's recent initiatives has been the promotion of the concept of Shareholder Committees as a way of improving corporate governance in public companies. To pursue this agenda we have today submitted a requisition for a resolution to be added to the Annual General Meeting of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS). A summary of what it said is given below (the full press release is here: https://www.sharesoc.org/pr85-rbs-shareholder-committee.html ): RBS Shareholders Demand Shareholder Committee (A joint press release on behalf of Private ...