As we hoped and expected, the SEC has rescinded the proxy advisory rules pushed through by partisan vote at the end of the Trump administration. (The complaint from the minority Commissioners about partisanship is predictable but utterly hypocritical.) We regret that the rules maintained the categorization of proxy advisory reports as solicitations but the CII…
Tag: proxy advisors
Proxy Advisory Firms Release First Reports on Latest Best Practices
For the first time, six of the world’s most influential shareholder voting research and analysis firms (better known as “proxy advisors”), which help institutional investors vote shares at stock-exchange-listed companies worldwide, have each publicly released reports showing how they comply with the latest industry Best Practice Principles. Proxy advisors have been a target of corporate…
Agenda – Glass Lewis Raises the Bar on Board Diversity, Environmental Oversight
Glass Lewis announced yesterday that it would issue adverse voting recommendations for nominating and governance committee chairs in 2022 if there is a lack of gender diversity on the board, or it determines that the board has been weak in overseeing environmental and social issues. Agenda – Glass Lewis Raises the Bar on Board Diversity,…
Supplemental Comments on SEC Proposed Rules: Proxy Advisors and Shareholder Proposals
ValueEdge Advisors has submitted two more supplemental comments on the SEC’s proposed rules on proxy advisory firms and shareholder proposals. We are grateful to James McRitchie for giving us permission to include his excellent research on the support for governance-related shareholder proposals. The full text of both comments are linked below. SEC supplemental comment on…
Center for Political Accountability on the SEC’s Proposed Rules on Proxy Proposals and Advisors
Behind the Chamber’s Attack on the Proxy Process, Fear of Disclosure – and CPA Founder’s Column By Bruce Freed Why is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce still running from sunlight? What are the Chamber and many of its members trying to hide? Just consider: –The Chamber receives dues from members it represents and “has spent…
Bebchuck Comment on Proxy Advisor Proposal
From Harvard professor Lucian Bebchuck’s comment to the SEC on the proxy advisor proposal: As explained below, the Economic Analysis cannot provide a basis for SEC rulemaking in this area. The Economic Analysis fails in its analysis of both the benefits and the costs of the proposed rule and overlooks significant effects and issues. Below…
Sock Puppet Ike Brannon is Still Lying About Proxy Advisors
Ike Brannon is whining about proxy advisors again on the unedited commentary section of Forbes. We last wrote about Ike Brannon’s anti-proxy advisor propaganda more than a year ago, pointing out that he does not disclose the funders and connections behind his fabricated claims about proxy advisors. Since he does not, we will remind him…
VEA Comment on the SEC’s Awful Proxy Advisory Proposal
The full text of our comment is below. An excerpt: I agree with the Commission’s own advisory committee and the letters on behalf of investors filed by CII, T. Rowe Price, John Coates and Barbara Roper, and others that this proposal is wrongly conceived. Despite the Commission’s rhetoric of support for proxy voting, this proposed…
Economists Comment to SEC Proposal on Proxy Advisors
On January 15, a group of over 60 leading finance professors from major American universities filed the following comment to the SEC to ask a revision of the proposed draft regulation: Dear Chairman Clayton and Members of the Commission: We share the Commission’s concerns about concentration in the proxy advisory market. Yet, we disagree with…
Nell Minow Debates Proposed SEC Rules on Proxy Advisors
On January 13, 2020, at the Stigler Center for the Study of Economy and the State, VEA Vice Chair Nell Minow debated University of Chicago professor Steven Kaplan on the new SEC proposed rules on proxy advisory firms, moderated by Luigi Zingales.
ValueEdge Advisors 