News & Events

On June 3, Corporate Partner A.J. Kess and Corporate Associate Yafit Cohn presented at a Practising Law Institute webinar, “Proxy Access Proposals in the 2015 Proxy Season,” which focused on the increase in proxy access proposals submitted by shareholders to public companies in 2015.  A.J. and Yafit explored how various companies responded to these proposals, analyzed the effectiveness of their strategies, discussed the levels of shareholder support received by these proposals, and provided advice as to what companies should be thinking about for the 2016 proxy season.  A.J., Yafit and co-participant Art Crozier, Chairman of Innisfree, were quoted in Bloomberg BNA, discussing the corporate community’s response to the increase in proxy access demands and making future projections. A.J. commented that “the takeaway of all the different approaches taken by the companies is that it’s really a lot of art and not that much science, which really makes it pretty difficult to advise boards and management as to what is the best approach.” Yafit added that a company’s “shareholder base is key” in evaluating its options for 2016.