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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 ...

FCA Reviews Open Ended Funds with Illiquid Assets

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is reviewing open ended funds that invest in such illiquid assets as property and infrastructure. It also potentially affects investments in private equity, unlisted securities and special purpose vehicles. If you recall, only a few months ago a number of property funds had to close to redemptions, i.e. investors could not get their money back, simply because of a minor panic over the impact of the Brexit Referendum vote. Although such funds do keep a cash ...

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 ...