Corporate governance - Vigil

The corporate world is never static, but the first years of this decade have presented an unusual compilation of challenges. The COVID-19 pandemic has posed a nearly unprecedented public health emergency, with lasting global implications. The stock markets have reached record highs, interest rates have fallen to record lows, and unemployment figures skyrocketed before labor markets tightened. The country weathered a divisive presidential election. At the same time, social justice concerns have taken hold. In 2020, protests for racial justice swept the country, leaving a sustained focus on how to address current inequities and past wrongs.

The hot new thing in the crypto world, the decentralized autonomous organization or DAO, gained attention this week when one of them nearly purchased an early copy of the U.S. Constitution on Thursday.

Energy drinks maker Monster Beverage Corp is discussing a merger with international beverage alcohol company Constellation Brands IncSTZ-N -0.81%decrease
, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters on Sunday.

The structure of a potential deal involving the companies, which have a combined market value of nearly $92-billion, was not immediately known.

KKR has launched a more than €33bn offer to take Telecom Italia private in what would be one of the largest private equity buyouts of a European company in history.

Pembina Pipeline Corp. says Mick Dilger has stepped down as president and chief executive to pursue other opportunities.

The company says its board has named chief financial officer Scott Burrows interim president and chief executive.

Cameron Goldade, Pembina’s vice-president, capital markets, has been named interim chief financial officer.

Legal and General Investment Management, the UK’s largest asset manager, will stop almost all direct feedback to companies on their executive pay, after finding its responses were ignored most of the time.

At a time when Americans and Europeans are wrestling with rising inflation, Japan shows how to keep consumer prices virtually flat.

After decades of very low inflation, Japanese shoppers resist paying higher prices and businesses seldom try to lift them. Companies hoard cash and stint on investment, and keep the labor market rigid so workers can’t easily move to growing businesses and get pay increases.

Activision Blizzard Inc. Chief Executive Bobby Kotick has told senior managers he would consider leaving the company if he can’t quickly fix the culture problems at the videogame giant, according to people familiar with his comments.

Mr. Kotick, who has led Activision for three decades, stopped short of saying he would step down in a Friday meeting with executives of the company’s Blizzard Entertainment unit, but left the possibility open if misconduct issues across the company weren’t fixed “with speed,” these people said.

UBS Group AG named former Morgan Stanley executive Colm Kelleher to succeed Axel Weber as its next chairman, landing a prominent Wall Street name to oversee the Swiss bank.

Valuations are frothy, market debuts are splashy and everyone’s got a SPAC. After decades, the roster of public companies is growing. That could mean big changes for business.

On Sept. 29, 2021, the Securities and Exchange Commission proposed Rule 14Ad‑1 and amendments to Form N-PX (collectively, “Proposal”) under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended (“1940 Act”), that, if adopted, would require more comprehensive information from mutual funds, exchange-traded funds and certain other investment companies registered under the 1940 Act that currently file reports on Form N-PX annually regarding their proxy votes, and would make that information provided easier to analyze. In addition, the Proposal would require all fund managers that are 13F filers [1] to disclose their proxy votes on executive compensation matters, otherwise called “say-on-pay” votes, annually on Form N-PX, regardless of whether or not they manage a registered investment company. The Proposal is intended to implement Section 951 of Dodd-Frank, which relates to managers’ reporting requirements.

In 2021, ESG investing has grown to $35+ trillion—over a third of the world’s professionally managed assets.

ESG is now well and truly mainstream across the globe. Soon ESG investing will be investing, or at the very least a fundamental component of all investing.

Our latest research uncovers the views of more than 300 institutional investors, revealing an industry poised for a surge in decarbonization target-setting over the next three years. Currently 20% of the most sophisticated have already set formal targets and momentum is clearly building for those yet to do so.

BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, announced on October 7, 2021 that it will start giving certain of its institutional index equity clients the ability to instruct BlackRock how those clients would like their votes to be cast at shareholder meetings of companies in BlackRock’s index funds. This move is savvy. BlackRock can look like a good corporate governance actor furthering shareholder democracy by placing voting power back into the hands of asset owners and deflect criticism that it too often defers to management and elects not to use its massive voting power in more activist ways. The announcement has received wide praise, but the move creates a few unknowns.

Eighty-six percent of US investors believe companies ‘frequently overstate or exaggerate their ESG progress when disclosing results,’ according to Edelman’s latest Trust Barometer report.

But it’s not just US investors who are skeptical when it comes to ESG credentials: globally, almost three quarters (72 percent) of investors say they don’t believe companies will achieve their ESG or diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) commitments.

Edward Rogers and Brad Shaw will appear in front of Canada’s telecom regulator on Monday to make their case for why Rogers Communications Inc.’s $26-billion takeover of Shaw Communications Inc. is vital to the future of both telecom companies.

The rise of ESG-focused investing should be defined by accountability. It should be easy for investors to discern a company’s ESG policies, reporting structures, and results.

Volkswagen’s supervisory board executive committee will meet on Tuesday to discuss the future of Chief Executive Herbert Diess, who is likely to remain at the helm of the car maker despite tensions over his management style, sources said on Monday.

It was not clear whether any decision would be made at Tuesday’s meeting, to be attended among others by works council head Daniela Cavallo and representatives of the majority shareholder families, Hans Michel Piech and Wolfgang Porsche, the sources with knowledge of the negotiations said.

Chief executive pay in the FTSE 100 has fallen by nearly a tenth this year, as companies reined in executive rewards under shareholder pressure during the pandemic.

An analysis of annual reports by PwC has also shown that many more companies are now involving environment, social or corporate governance criteria in their pay policies.

The healthcare technology company Athenahealth is close to being sold to the private equity firms Bain Capital and Hellman & Friedman, according to people familiar with the situation, in a $17bn deal that would bring down the curtain on a buyout fashioned from one of the hardest-fought activist campaigns in recent memory.

The private equity firm Veritas Capital and the hedge fund Elliott Management took Athenahealth private four years ago, months after former chief executive Jonathan Bush resigned in the aftermath of revelations about his personal life

Global supply-chain woes are beginning to recede, but shipping, manufacturing and retail executives say that they don’t expect a return to more-normal operations until next year and that cargo will continue to be delayed if Covid-19 outbreaks disrupt key distribution hubs.

In Asia, Covid-related factory closures, energy shortages and port-capacity limits have eased in recent weeks. In the U.S., major retailers say they have imported most of what they need for the holidays. Ocean freight rates have retreated from record levels.

THE FRISSON of relief among some of America’s most outspoken left-leaning economists is unmistakable. Whenever other countries report high inflation figures, they seize on it as evidence that America’s own bout of price rises is part of a global trend. “I hate to ruin the victory lap of all the people boasting that Biden’s Recovery Act would be inflationary, but the UK also had a big jump in inflation, with no big stimulus,” tweeted Dean Baker of the Centre for Economic and Policy Research, a think-tank, on November 17th. A few days earlier Paul Krugman, a Nobel-prizewinning economist, made a similar comparison between Europe and America. “What’s happening in the United States isn’t mainly about policy,” he concluded.

Former insurance company CEO will succeed Paul Achleitner when he retires in May 2022 after overseeing the bank for a decade

Ericsson agreed to buy cloud-communications provider Vonage Holdings Corp., for $6.2 billion, in deal that the Swedish telecom-equipment maker said will expand its wireless enterprise business and broaden its global offerings.

Long-run buy-and-hold stock market returns with dividend reinvestment (“total shareholder returns” or “TSR”) are significantly higher than risk-free returns, leading to an annual equity risk premium of about 6%. Stocks are thus pitched as a key component of wealth accumulation strategies and have become an important savings vehicle for American families. The high equity premium has also led policymakers to consider investing Social Security funds in the stock market.

ESG scoring, scrutiny and integration is a concept that generally originated and evolved in the public markets. However, it is now making its way into the world of private equity. Asset owners are seeking and, in some cases, requiring, sustainable options from their asset managers. We feel asset managers need to expand their current ESG by implementing a plan that allows them to navigate the evolving landscape. ESG concepts are beginning to be included throughout the fundraising, investing, and reporting processes. In order to compete for quality capital, General Partners needs to institute ESG reporting that consists of three key attributes—disclosure type and sophistication, balance between qualitative commentary and quantitative KPIs, and finally the prevalence and influence of reporting frameworks and metrics.