PiedmontSteward
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The Teamsters have been fighting for an independent board chairman at FedEx for years. That fight got a big boost this week with the nation’s two largest proxy advisors telling the company’s shareholders that they should back the Teamsters’ call for a new leader at the company’s Sept. 23 annual meeting.
http://www.teamsternation.blogspot.com/2013/09/proxy-advisor-tells-FedEx-shareholders-to-axe-ceo.html
Definition of a proxy adviser, via Wikipedia:
[/SUP]A proxy firm (also a proxy advisor) is a firm hired by shareholders of public companies (usually large institutions) to recommend and sometimes cast proxy statement votes on their behalf. The top two proxy firms are Glass, Lewis & Co. and Institutional Shareholder Services (most currently a subsidiary of MSCI after that firms acquisition of Riskmetrics).[SUP][1][/SUP] Additional proxy advisory firms include Egan-Jones Proxy Services, Marco Consulting Group and C&W Investment Group.[SUP][2][/SUP] Recently, as of first quarter 2012, a new firm going by the name ProxyTell, LLC appears to have entered this market.[SUP][3][/SUP]
By some accounts, ISS advised half of the common stock in the world as of 2010.[SUP][4][/SUP] Some proxy firms play the role of proxy advisor, in which they simply advise their clients on how to vote.[SUP][5][/SUP] A potential conflict of interest identified by the Government Accountability Office is that some owners of proxy firms do business with both issuers and investors.[SUP][6][/SUP] In many cases, proxy firms have attempted to limit executive compensation.[SUP][7]