Third Point CEO Daniel Loeb David Paul Morris/Bloomberg After a tough year, Intel executives received one last 2020 surprise. It came in the form of a sharply worded letter this past week from activist investor Daniel Loeb. Loeb, CEO of hedge fund Third Point, laid out the need for change at the once pioneering chip maker...
Japan is a country of contradictions. Its bullet trains, advanced robotics, and kiosk culture are a model of efficiency, but businesses still rely on paper documents and fax machines. It’s home to some of the most innovative companies in the world, and yet it is the poster child of sluggish growth and an aging population...
A group representing hundreds of institutional investors is stepping up pressure on drugmakers to ensure Covid-19 vaccines and therapies are affordable and widely accessible...
Investors have been using shareholder resolutions to voice concerns and shape corporate practices to combat racial injustice. Fund companies, with their huge assets and meaningful stakes, can leverage their proxy votes to support these changes. Still, some are more supportive than others...
Jack Dorsey, chief executive officer of Twitter. Cole Burston/Bloomberg Twitter said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission late Monday that the company’s board of directors had reviewed CEO Jack Dorsey’s leadership and will allow him to remain as top boss. Shares of Twitter (ticker: TWTR) rose nearly 6% to $41.79 early afternoon Tuesday...
The number of Black appointees to Russell 3000 corporate boards surged in the wake of George Floyd’s death and the racial justice movement that ensued, with Procter & Gamble,Pinterest, PepsiCo, Target, and UPSamong the companies that appointed Black directors, according to research that BoardProspects, a digital platform for companies to find board talent and C-suite executives, shared with Barron’s...
Crown said Monday it is “open to considering opportunities to create value.” Dreamstime Activist investor Elliott Management is ratcheting up the pressure on Crown Castle . The hedge fund disclosed a $1 billion stake in the Houston-based cell tower firm last month , arguing that Crown wasn’t getting proportional rewards for its hefty investment of time and money in its fiber-cable business...
Real-estate-data firm CoreLogic says a $65-per-share bid by Senator Investment Group and Cannae Holdings undervalues the company. Senator and Cannae are looking for a third investor to push the deal. Joe Raedle/Getty Images There has been a paucity of activist fights to track in 2020, but signs suggest that one of this year’s battles is shaping up to be a bruiser...
Get ready for an office real-estate reset. At least, that’s what activist investor Jonathan Litt of Land & Buildings , known for agitating for change at Taubman Centers and now-private Hudson’s Bay, expects. Litt has reportedly been betting against stocks of New York City office landlords now that expensive, densely populated urban centers have lost some luste r. “The genie is out of the bottle—you can’t put it back in,” Litt tells Barron’s , adding that he expects lower valuations and rents as owners navigate through the pandemic. “Stay alive until 2025,” he quips. Last week Litt ...
For decades, investors have recognized the importance of good corporate governance as a contributor to a company’s long-term prospects. Recent years have seen a growing consensus that good environmental stewardship can enhance returns, as well...
GameStop stock jumped Friday after the videogame retailer said that based on preliminary results , two nominees from an activist investor group were elected to its board of directors. Kurtis Wolf and Paul Evans, who were nominated by Hestia Capital Partners and Permit Capital Enterprise Fund, will join the company’s 10-person board. The group beneficially owns 7.3% of GameStop (ticker: GME) shares outstanding...
This proxy season, annual meetings are going virtual, companies have discovered their kinder selves amid a pandemic, and once-quiescent investors are more vocal about corporate accountability...
“Berkshire needs an activist,” says Bill Smead, the lead manager of the Smead Value fund, which counts Berkshire Hathaway among its top 10 holdings. Smead’s comments reflect the frustration of some Berkshire Hathaway shareholders who complain that CEO Warren Buffett has been too cautious during the recent market turmoil...
Boeing hosts its annual shareholder meeting on Monday. The timing is a little odd—the meeting comes before first-quarter numbers get reported on Wednesday . (Usually earnings come before annual meetings.) The meeting likely will generate some news and potentially some controversy. But the news won’t be about Covid-19 , the aerospace downturn , or the troubled 737 MAX . Those topics will have to wait until Wednesday...
Office REIT Mack-Cali said it does not plan to renominate four Bow Street-nominated directors to its board...
Moody’s chopped its rating on SoftBank Group debt by two notches Wednesday. The move came as a surprise to the Japanese telecom giant, which responded by asking Moody’s to withdraw all of its ratings on the company , arguing that the ratings agency has “biased and mistaken views.” The spat comes at a surprising moment. SoftBank shares (ticker: SFTBY) have had a big run over the last few days, up 55% since Friday...
Amid a long-running bull market, it can be easy to forget that trust in our market system is built on the subtle rules that guide interactions. Now, a crucial investor safeguard is under attack by the very institution whose mission it is to protect investors and promote transparency...
Parsing CEO pay can be a chore. It’s broken down by base salary, target bonuses, target long term incentive awards, pensions, separate milestones and signing bonuses. It’s Byzantine. It’s enough to say American CEOs are well compensated...
The early hours of the new trading year haven’t been any friendlier to Canadian cannabis stocks. Shares of all the biggest names, aside from Hexo , were down more than 4% just before 2 p.m. on Thursday. Aurora Cannabis stock (ticker: ACB) was down 6%, a bad start for a stock that’s shed 60% of its value in the past year...
Hedge-fund investor Richard Merage is taking some money from his, uh, hot pockets and pushing for change at Groupon...
Xerox Holdings’ bid for HP Inc. has become nastier, with the company now threatening a hostile takeover bid to combine the printer companies...
Trying to understand executive pay is a guaranteed descent into lunacy. How much pay is too much—or not enough? When does pay incentivize performance—and when does it spawn complacency? Can CEOs be aligned with shareholders by dousing them in stock options? Isn’t excessive pay analogous to certain addictive substances—the more you get, the more you need? When, pray tell, is pay fair? These questions dance around a coming trial in Delaware’s Chancery Court...
The National Business Aviation Association , or NBAA, show started in Las Vegas on Tuesday. It’s like a car show, but with jets—a hot topic these days. Private jet use is in the spotlight after an activist criticized Emerson Electric ’s (ticker: EMR) private jet “fleet” when arguing for lower costs. Many companies use private jets—including PG&E (PCG) and Facebook (FB)—but they don’t tend to advertise it...
AT&T ’s board got an unwelcome surprise this past Monday, when a well-known activist investor decided to question the company’s long-honed—and expensive—strategy. For investors, though, Elliott Management’s new focus on AT&T is likely to have positive long-term benefits...