Proxy Voting

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The Council of Institutional Investors (CII), an investor advocacy association primarily for pension funds and local governments, has put forth a proposal to amend the Delaware General Corporation Law to limit the ability of publicly-traded Delaware corporations to maintain multi-class common stock voting structures (i.e., high-vote/low-vote stock structures).
Continue Reading Institutional Investor Advocacy Group Proposes Limits to Multi-Class Voting by Delaware Companies

On August 20, a federal magistrate judge in the Eastern District of New York granted a motion for summary judgment in a derivative case brought against purported 10 percent stockholders of 1-800-Flowers.com, Inc. Pursuant to Section 16 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, the judge found a hedge fund liable as a 10 percent owner, despite the fact that it had delegated voting and investment authority to its investment adviser.
Continue Reading Federal Court Rules Investment Fund is 10 Percent Owner in Section 16 Case

Investment Advisers

On August 21, by a vote of 3 to 2, the Securities and Exchange Commission issued interpretive guidance on an investment adviser’s fiduciary duties with respect to voting of proxies for client accounts. The guidance makes clear that advisers may agree with their clients that the client, and not the adviser, will vote proxies, but such guidance is generally impractical for advisers to private funds and registered investment companies (because there is no practical way to assign voting power to the funds).
Continue Reading SEC Issues New Guidance Regarding Proxy Voting Responsibility of Investment Advisers and the Applicability of Proxy Rules to Proxy Voting Advice

On May 11, the staff of the Division of Corporation Finance of the Securities and Exchange Commission (the Staff) issued 45 Compliance and Disclosure Interpretations (C&DIs) that relate to the proxy rules and proxy statements, replacing the Staff’s prior interpretations that were published in the Proxy Rules and Schedule 14A Manual of Publicly Available Telephone Interpretations (the Manual) and the March 1999 Supplement to the Manual (the Supplement). Thirty-five of the C&DIs reiterate prior guidance from the Manual and the Supplement. This article highlights the six C&DIs that reflect substantive changes and the four C&DIs that reflect technical changes to the prior guidance in the Manual and the Supplement. The Staff also noted that it is in the process of updating other previously published interpretations relating to the proxy rules.
Continue Reading SEC Division of Corporation Finance Issues C&DIs on Proxy Rules and Proxy Statements, Overhauling Telephone Interpretations Manual

Proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) recently updated its frequently asked questions (FAQs) for US proxy voting policies and procedures (excluding compensation-related policies and procedures). The following is a brief summary of the new/updated FAQs.
Continue Reading ISS Updates Frequently Asked Questions for US Proxy Voting Policies and Procedures for 2017

On Thursday, December 8 at 12:00 p.m. (CT), please join Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP, Ernst & Young LLP and Sard Verbinnen & Co. for a webinar discussion of key developments and trends impacting public companies in the 2017 annual report and proxy season.

Further details are available here; click here to register.

On November 21, ISS published its 2017 Proxy Voting Guideline Updates, which will be in effect for meetings held on or after February 1, 2017. The US 2017 updates cover numerous policies, with significant changes summarized below:

Restricting Binding Shareholder Proposals

ISS introduced a new policy to recommend against or withhold from members of the governance committee if a company’s charter imposes undue restrictions on shareholders’ ability to amend its bylaws. Such restrictions include outright prohibition on the submission of binding shareholder proposals, or share ownership requirements or time holding requirements in excess of SEC Rule 14a-8.
Continue Reading ISS Releases 2017 Proxy Voting Guideline Updates

On November 18, Glass Lewis released its 2017 U.S. Proxy Season Guidelines. The guidelines are a detailed overview of the key policies Glass Lewis applies when analyzing individual companies and are formally updated on an annual basis.

One of the more significant changes to the Glass Lewis Guidelines is the director overboarding policy. Under this policy, Glass Lewis will generally recommend voting against a director who serves as an executive officer of any public company while serving on a total of more than two public company boards, and against any other director who serves on a total of more than five public company boards. Glass Lewis may consider factors such as the size and location of the other companies where the director serves on the board, the director’s board roles at the companies in question, whether or not the director serves on the board of any large privately held companies, the director’s tenure on the boards in question, and the director’s attendance record at all companies. Glass Lewis may refrain from recommending against certain directors if the company provides sufficient rationale for their continued board service.
Continue Reading Glass Lewis Releases 2017 Proxy Season Guidelines

On October 26, the Securities and Exchange Commission voted to propose amendments to the proxy rules that would require the use of universal proxy cards in contested elections (i.e., in a contested election, shareholders would be provided with a proxy card that contains the names of both the management nominees and one or more dissident shareholder nominees for the board of directors).
Continue Reading SEC Proposes Amendments To Require Universal Proxy Cards in Contested Elections

As previously reported in the Corporate and Financial Weekly Digest edition of October 30, 2015, the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Corporation Finance (“Division”) issued Staff Legal Bulletin No. 14H (SLB 14H) on October 22, 2015. SLB 14H established a new standard for determining when a shareholder proposal conflicts with a company proposal (providing that a direct conflict would exist if a reasonable shareholder could not logically vote for both proposals) and therefore may be excluded from the company’s proxy statement under Rule 14a-8(i)(9).
Continue Reading SEC Issues No-Action Relief Pursuant to Rule 14a-8(i)(9)