Shareholder spring targets UBM board pay May 14, 2012 THE SHAREHOLDER spring yesterday hit another leading firm as media group UBM announced it had narrowly avoided defeat on its executive pay deal. More than 47 per cent of investors failed to back the directors’ remuneration report, a result that would have been considered extraordinary before a recent spate of shareholder rebellions against pay levels [...]
THE TIPSTER Aviva shedding profits and chief execs May 14, 2012 TO lose a chief executive is always rather unfortunate, but Aviva’s long-suffering shareholders must be hoping that Andrew Moss’s departure will allow the company to begin a recovery operation, but any effort will be long and involved. A possible sale of the non-life insurance operations might help shore up the capital base, but the group’s [...]
TUC: Only workers’ reps can rein in excessive bosses pay May 13, 2012 MOVES to give shareholders binding votes over executive pay do not go far enough, the Trades Union Congress (TUC) claimed today. The labour body believes that workers should sit on remuneration committees in order to “introduce a touch of the real world to the process of setting top pay.” Growing shareholder anger at poor business [...]
LONDON REPORT May 13, 2012 THIS week will see a string of stormy annual meetings, which will be closely watched for signs that the “shareholder spring” is taking hold. The market is also due to digest some key earnings reports on Thursday and Facebook’s long-awaited US float on Friday. However, today looks set to be relatively quiet on the corporate [...]
O’Shea warns nervy Quins as final beckons May 13, 2012 HARLEQUINS director of rugby Conor O’Shea admits his troops will have to learn to cope better under pressure after they overcame a nervy start to book their place in the Aviva Premiership final. The table toppers needed a try from Joe Marler five minutes from time to edge past Northampton 25-23 in Saturday’s semi-final at [...]
Shareholder Spring claims new casualties May 10, 2012 THE SHAREHOLDER Spring continued to blossom yesterday as investors rejected another executive pay settlement. Pendragon, Britain’s leading car dealer, was forced to back down on plans to increase its directors’ pay packets after 67 per cent of shareholders voted against its remuneration report. Meanwhile almost half of Trinity Mirror investors voted against the proposed pay [...]
City bonuses to crash to lowest level since 1998 May 9, 2012 CITY bonuses for the current financial year are set to collapse to the lowest level in fourteen years according to new analysis. For 2012/2013 performance-based bonuses are expected to total £2.3bn – a near 50 per cent crash from this year’s £4.4bn total and less than a fifth of the £11.6bn peak in 2007/08, according [...]
Aviva ex-boss loses share bonus May 9, 2012 Aviva’s former chief executive Andrew Moss waved goodbye to a £2.4m bonus after quitting the insurance firm earlier this week. Moss was considered by the remuneration committee not to be a “good leaver” and will not be paid two bonus schemes’ worth of deferred shares. Nonetheless, Moss will still pocket a £1.75m golden goodbye. MORE [...]
Aviva exits Malaysia May 9, 2012 BRITISH insurance firm Aviva has put its Malaysian operations on the block and is close to hiring a bank to help with the sale process, according to reports. The deal, which is in its early stages, could raise around $200m (£124m). Aviva has a long held ambition to exit non-core markets as part of strategy [...]
Shareholder activism proves that regulating pay would be senseless May 9, 2012 ANDREW Moss, who had been in charge of Aviva since 2007, became the third chief executive to quit amid increasing shareholder discontent in recent weeks, following David Brennan at AstraZeneca and Trinity Mirror’s Sly Bailey. Just what is going on with the public limited company, one of the great inventions of capitalism? It has provided [...]