Shareholder Democracy

Press Release – Response to Green Paper on Corporate Governance

ShareSoc has today issued the following press release: How to fix the ills of the UK Corporate Governance scene? ShareSoc and UKSA have given their solutions in a response to the Government Green Paper on Corporate Governance Reform. We have emphasised that the following are the key issues: Engagement between shareholders and companies is not working. Shareholders are not exercising effective stewardship and control, and boards are failing to fulfil their fiduciary obligations to members. As a result, public trust in business is ...

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 ...

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 ...

RBS Rejects Democracy

ShareSoc has today issued the following press release: The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has rejected a requisition to implement a Shareholder Committee. ShareSoc will not permit this unreasonable...

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 ...

Fenner AGM Requisition. Why Is It Not a Good Idea?

Fenner Plc (FENR) are the subject of a requisition of a resolution to appoint another director at their forthcoming Annual General Meeting on 11th January. ShareSoc is particularly interested in requisitioned resolutions at present because we are trying to get one added to the Royal Bank of Scotland AGM (see www.sharesoc.org/campaigns/rbs/). In the case of Fenner, activist Swiss investor Teleios Capital Partners have put forward the requisition, with the support of a number of other investors. Teleios hold over 5% and have ...

Shareholder Rights Directive Agreed – But It’s Still Defective

There has been agreement within the EU on the final form of the Shareholder Rights Directive. What follows is the press release issued by Better Finance (a body that represents individual investors across the EU and of which ShareSoc is a Member). PRESS RELEASE PRESIDENCY AND PARLIAMENT AGREE ON REVIEW OF SHAREHOLDERS RIGHTS DIRECTIVE: LIMITED IMPROVEMENTS FOR SHAREHOLDERS 14 December 2016 - On 9 December 2016 the EU presidency and the EU Parliament agreed on the final version of the new Shareholders ...

IDOX and Prejudicial Placings

One of the things that private investors hate is placings made by companies to raise money in which they cannot participate. In other words, the issuance of shares that dilutes your interest in the company when it is not a rights issue and there is no "open offer" alongside. Sometimes those placings are done at a price which is a considerable discount to the open market share price, thus enabling institutional investors to pick up shares at a big discount to ...

Campaign to Obtain Shareholder Committee at RBS

This note has been issued by ShareSoc to its Members (but anyone can join in to support the campaign): ShareSoc has advocated the implementation of Shareholder Committees since our...