Voici les résultats d’une étude empirique réalisée par un groupe de chercheurs éminents : Lucian Bebchuk*, Harvard Law School, Alon Brav, Duke University, et Wei Jiang, Columbia Business School, et publiée dans le Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation le 19 août 2013. Selon les auteurs, cette étude démontre que les activités des investisseurs activistes (Hedge Funds) n’ont pas d’effets négatifs sur les intérêts à long-terme des entreprises et de leurs actionnaires.
Les résultats de l’étude indiquent que les comportements des actionnaires activistes ont même des effets positifs à long terme, contrairement aux prétentions de plusieurs opposants de ces activités insuffisamment règlementées. Nous avons souvent discuté de cette problématique sur notre blogue mais c’est la première fois que nous présentons les résultats d’une recherche scientifique aussi importante.
Je vous invite à prendre connaissance du résumé de cette étude en consultant le document ci-dessous.
Il y a deux grands courants de pensée qui divisent le monde de la gouvernance et qui s’opposent “royalement” :
(1) celui des investisseurs activistes qui tentent de tirer profit des failles perçues dans les orientations et la gestion des grandes entreprises cotées, en investissant massivement dans celles-ci et en proposant des changements radicaux de stratégies (fusion, restructuration, recapitalisation, contestation des PCD et des membres de conseils, etc…).
Selon ce groupe, les actionnaires sont rois et on se doit d’intervenir lorsque les entreprises ne sont pas gérées efficacement.
(2) celui des défenseurs de l’autorité des C.A. dans leurs rôles de fiduciaires, représentant les intérêts des actionnaires et des autres parties prenantes.
Selon ce groupe, ce sont les conseils d’administration qui prennent les décisions de nature stratégique en fonction de l’intérêt à long terme des entreprises. Les autorités règlementaires doivent donc intervenir pour restreindre les activités des investissements “court-termistes” […].
Voici un document émanant d’une présentation d’Yvan Allaire* à la conférence nationale de l’Institut des administrateurs de sociétés (Institute of Corporate Directors) à Toronto le 22 mai 2013 dont le thème était Shareholder Activism: Short vs. Long-termism. Dans son article, l’auteur prend une position affirmative en tentant d’expliquer les comportements court-termistes des actionnaires (investisseurs) activistes. Ce document mérite que l’on s’y penche pour réfléchir à trois questions fondamentales en gouvernance. Les questions soulevées dans le document sont les suivantes :
(1) La gestion avec une perspective court-termiste représente-t-elle un problème sérieux ?
(2) Les investisseurs activistes sont-ils des joueurs court-termistes dont les actions ont des conséquences négatives pour les entreprises à long terme ?
(3) Les conseils d’administration des sociétés canadiennes doivent-ils être mieux protégés des actions des investisseurs activistes et des offres d’achat hostiles ? […]
J’ai choisi de partager avec les lecteurs un article de Holly J. Gregory, associé de Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, paru sur le blogue de Harvard Law School Forum (HLSF) on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation. Ce billet présente un solide argumentaire en faveur de la préservation d’un juste équilibre entre les principaux acteurs de la gouvernance : les actionnaires, les administrateurs, les managers, les conseillers et les autorités règlementaires.
Il est clair que le conseil d’administration, élu par les actionnaires, a toujours la responsabilité de l’orientation, de la surveillance et du suivi de l’organisation. Mais l’environnement de la gouvernance a changé et les actionnaires peuvent maintenant se référer aux avis exprimés par les firmes spécialisées de conseils en procuration pour mieux faire entendre leurs voix.L’auteur tente de clarifier les rôles de tous les acteurs en insistant sur les équilibres fragiles à préserver dans la gouvernance des sociétés […]
Dans ce billet, nous présentons une solide prise de position sur le comportement des fonds activistes (“hedge funds”) par Martin Lipton, partenaire fondateur de la firme Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, et publiée dans Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance. L’auteur montre comment les fonds activistes peuvent souvent agir en fonction d’intérêts contraires aux actionnaires. L’auteur soulève une multitude de questions qui doivent trouver des réponses adéquates […]
Voici une excellente revue, parue dans Bloomberg Businessweek, au sujet de l’interventionnisme croissant des investisseurs institutionnels dans les décisions des conseils d’administration. On assiste à un changement significatif du comportement des grands investisseurs qui se joignent de plus en plus aux groupes d’actionnaires activistes pour exiger des changements dans le management de l’entreprise, plus particulièrement dans la conduite du PCD (CEO).
Les PCD sont de plus en plus conscients de l’influence significative des actionnaires et des grands investisseurs dans la gestion de l’entreprise; ils apprennent à reconnaître qui est le réel patron de l’organisation (le C.A., de plus en plus influencé par l’activisme des actionnaires).
L’article résume la situation de la manière suivante : “As big investors press Boards, the number of directors who failed to win majorities in shareholder votes has almost tripled since 2006″. […]
Dans son blogue, Governance Gateway, Richard Leblanc exprime son point de vue (1) sur les raisons qui incitent les actionnaires activistes à intervenir dans les activités des entreprises, et (2) sur le concept d’actionnariat au sens large. L’auteur tente de répondre à plusieurs questions fondamentales :
Quelles sont les responsabilités des conseils d’administration dans les cas d’activisme des actionnaires et d’offres d’achat non-sollicitées ?
Quel est le devoir du C.A. envers les actionnaires … et envers les parties prenantes ?
Comment définir la “valeur” des actionnaires ?
Quelle est la place des consultants dans ce processus ?
Autant de questions auxquelles l’auteur tente d’apporter des réponses sensés. Ce sont des prises de positions qui peuvent avoir de grandes incidences sur le modèle de gouvernance existant ! […]
Le Conference Board publie un compte rendu d’experts sur l’activisme des actionnaires en période d’incertitude. The recent Governance Watch webcast, Shareholder Activism in Uncertain Times, raised important questions for both management and boards to consider in the midst of an economic climate that is making many companies particularly. […]
Ci-dessous un extrait de l’article de Bebchuket al.
We recently completed an empirical study, The Long-Term Effects of Hedge Fund Activism, that tests the empirical validity of a claim that has been playing a central role in debates on corporate governance – the claim that interventions by activist shareholders, and in particular activist hedge funds, have an adverse effect on the long-term interests of companies and their shareholders. While this “myopic activists” claim has been regularly invoked and has had considerable influence, its supporters have thus far failed to back it up with evidence. Our study presents a comprehensive emp irical investigation of this claim. Our findings have important policy implications for ongoing policy debates on corporate governance and the rights and role of shareholders…
… Our study uses a dataset consisting of the full universe of approximately 2,000 interventions by activist hedge funds during the period 1994–2007. We identify for each activist effort the month (the intervention month) in which the activist initiative was first publicly disclosed (usually through the filing of a Schedule 13D). Using the data on operating performance and stock returns of public companies during the period 1991-2012, we track the operating performance and stock returns for companies during a long period – five years – following the intervention month. We also examine the three-year period that precedes activist interventions and that follows activists’ departure.
Hauser Hall (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Starting with operating performance, we find that operating performance improves following activist interventions and there is no evidence that the improved performance comes at the expense of performance later on. During the third, fourth, and fifth year following the start of an activist intervention, operating performance tends to be better, not worse, than during the pre-intervention period. Thus, during the long, five-year time window that we examine, the declines in operating performance asserted by supporters of the myopic activism claim are not found in the data. We also find that activists tend to target companies that are underperforming relative to industry peers at the time of the intervention, not well-performing ones.
We then turn to stock returns following the initial stock price spike that is well-known to accompany activist interventions. We first find that, consistent with the results obtained with respect to pre-intervention operating performance, targets of activists have negative abnormal returns during the three years preceding the intervention. We then proceed to examine whether, as supporters of the myopic activism claim believe, the initial stock price reflects inefficient market pricing that fails to reflect the long-term costs of the activist intervention and is thus followed by stock return underperformance in the long term.
In investigating the presence of negative abnormal returns during this period, we employ three standard methods used by financial economists for detecting stock return underperformance. In particular, the study examines: first, whether the returns to targeted companies were systematically lower than what would be expected given standard asset pricing models; second, whether the returns to targeted companies were lower than those of “matched” firms that are similar in terms of size and book to market; and, third, whether a portfolio based on taking positions in activism targets and holding them for five years underperforms relative to its risk characteristics. Using each of these methods, we find no evidence of the asserted reversal of fortune during the five-year period following the intervention. The long-term underperformance asserted by supporters of the myopic activism claim, and the resulting losses to long-term shareholders resulting from activist interventions, are not found in the data.
We also analyze whether activists cash out their stakes before negative stock returns occur and impose losses on remaining long-term shareholders. Because activist hedge funds have been documented to deliver adequate returns to their own investors, such a pattern is a necessary condition for long-term shareholders being made worse off by activist interventions. We therefore examine whether targets of activist hedge funds experience negative abnormal returns in the three years after an activist discloses that its holdings fell below the 5% threshold that subjects investors to significant disclosure requirements. Again using the three standard methods for detecting the existence of abnormal stock returns, we find no evidence that long-term shareholders experience negative stock returns during the three years following the partial or full cashing out of an activist’s stake.
We next turn to examine the two subsets of activist interventions that are most resisted and criticized – first, interventions that lower or constrain long-term investments by enhancing leverage, beefing up shareholder payouts, or reducing investments and, second, adversarial interventions employing hostile tactics. In both cases, interventions are followed by improvements in operating performance during the five-year period following the intervention, and no evidence is found for the adverse long-term effects asserted by opponents.
Finally, we examine whether activist interventions render targeted companies more vulnerable to economic shocks. In particular, we examine whether companies targeted by activist interventions during the years preceding the financial crisis were hit more in the subsequent crisis. We find no evidence that pre-crisis interventions by activists were associated with greater declines in operating performance or higher incidence of financial distress during the crisis.
Our findings that the data does not support the claims and empirical predictions of those holding the myopic activism view have significant implications for ongoing policy debates. Going forward, policymakers and institutional investors should not accept the validity of assertions that interventions by hedge funds are followed by long-term adverse consequences for companies and their long-term shareholders. The use of such claims as a basis for limiting shareholder rights and involvement should be rejected.
*Lucian Bebchuk is Professor of Law, Economics, and Finance at Harvard Law School. Alon Brav is Professor of Finance at Duke University. Wei Jiang, Professor of Finance at Columbia Business School. This post is based on their study, The Long-Term Effects of Hedge Fund Activism, available here. An op-ed about the article published in the Wall Street Journal summarizing the results of the study is available here.
Voici un article de Alice Korngold publié dans le Huffington Post – Canada du 9 septembre 2012 qui traite d’un thème très important pour la gouvernance des OBNL. L’auteure aborde quatre facteurs essentiels que les conseils d’administration doivent considérer pour assurer une bonne gouvernance :
L’accomplissement de la mission, de la vision et du modèle d’affaires de l’OBNL;
La mise en place de mécanismes permettant de mesurer adéquatement les réalisations de l’organisation (accountability);
Le sentiment d’appartenance (ownership) et d’identité des membres du conseil à l’organisation;
L’exercice de surveillance (oversight) de la gestion de l’OBNL.
« With the mission, vision and revenue model set, the board can organize itself for success as follows:
Board size: the fewest number of board members that will be required
Board composition: the particular expertise, experience, diversity, and networks that will be needed among board members to maximize success
Expectations: a clear statement of expectations – that addresses meeting attendance, giving, fundraising, etc. – that is agreed upon among current board members and also shared among new board recruits
Board structure: committees that are needed to logically organize the work
Meeting agendas: to focus attention and discussions
Leadership: the qualifications required to lead for success
Board development: the board assesses and improves itself on a regular basis
A transition plan: for the board to transition its composition, leadership, and structure in order to maximize the organization’s greatest potential in service to the community
When board members embrace their responsibility, commit to engage productively, and contribute generously, then they can accomplish great things in achieving the mission and the organization’s greater potential. That’s the role of the board ».
*Je suis en congé jusqu’à la fin septembre. Durant cette période, j’ai décidé de rééditer les billets considérés comme étant les plus pertinents par les lecteurs de mon blogue (depuis le début des activités le 19 juillet 2011).
Voici un court texte publié par Bill Conroy* sur le site de OpenviewLabs qui présente quelques méthodes efficaces pour assurer la bonne conduite des réunions de conseils d’administration. La préparation et la gestion des réunions de C.A. sont certainement deux activités essentielles à la saine gouvernance des sociétés.
L’auteur insiste tout particulièrement sur l’adoption de deux méthodes :
(1) le livre de contrôle (control book) et
(2) le meeting de gestion précédent le C.A.
Je vous invite à prendre connaissance du site OpenviewLabs. Que pensez-vous de ces deux approches ? Vos commentaires sont les bienvenus.
« Bill Conroy, formerly CEO of Initiate Systems and currently a director at Kareo, Prognosis, and AtTask is a seasoned boardroom veteran who has often been “in companies where everybody is running up and down the hallways” hours before the board meeting is set to begin, frantically trying to finish preparations and reports. He has two remedies for manic board meeting preparation: 1) the control book; and 2) a management meeting prior to the board meeting ».
Conroy calls the control book “a source of truth,” and considers it the only reporting that really matters. “It is published monthly to the board, as well as to the management team,” he says, eliminating the scramble before the meeting and the numbers update during the meeting since “the directors have been getting the control book in the same format all of the time.”
Inside the control book, board members find performance metrics, a profit and loss breakdown, a cash statement, a retention report, growth drivers, and any other salient reports that you know the board is after. The key is to make sure that all of the numbers are included and presented in the same format month after month. That way, Conroy says, “there is no discussion about what the numbers are in the board meeting, which is a total waste of time,” and you can focus on “what the numbers mean.”
(2) The Management Meeting: “80% of the board meeting”
Conroy recommends holding your management meeting one or two days prior to the board meeting. The format and deliverables for the management meeting should be 80% of what’s needed in the board meeting, making it an excellent form of board meeting preparation.
All presenters in the management meeting should be limited to 2-3 slides but discussion time should not be limited. Kick off the meeting with “somebody who is capable of being very neutral talking about the market,” so that he or she can provide an honest assessment of whether your company is gaining or losing market share. Next, have your product lead present the product roadmap like a forecast. “What are we going to deliver and are we on schedule?”
RDECOM Board of Directors holds meeting (Photo credit: RDECOM)
After that, sales presents a simple breakdown of quarterly deals that have been closed, deals they are so confident in they can commit they will close, and upside deals. The sales leader also needs to take a stab at an end-of-year outlook regardless of what the current quarter is.
The CFO follows sales, and — instead of presenting what the numbers are — presents two slides discussing what the numbers mean, and what the causes for concern are. The CEO closes out the agenda by covering the company’s strategic initiatives and progress made on those fronts. The CEO needs to tell the board “what keeps me up at night” about the company.
Market overview
Product roadmap
Sales recap & forecast
CFO presentation
CEO presentation
“If you go through all of those things in a management meeting,” Conroy says, take time afterward to fine tune them, and then have “the exact same people give the exact same reports” at the board meeting, you’re setting yourself up for an efficient discussion with the board.
Between the control book and the management meeting, you create “a lot of extra time for people to be focused externally as opposed to internally.” In board meetings, most of the discussion is around the numbers, and Conroy sees that as the main reason why they get bogged down. But the monthly control book gives “the directors plenty of time to make calls to the CFO” to inquire about numbers, leaving board meetings for what the CEO should really be focused on: strategy.
Vous trouverez, ci-joint, la dernière version du Rapport Bourgogne, publié par CIRANO, un centre de recherche multidisciplinaire qui a pour mission l’accélération du transfert des savoirs entre le monde de la recherche et celui de la pratique.
L’étude réalisée par Nathalie de Marcellis-Warin, professeure agrégée à l’École Polytechnique de Montréal et vice-présidente au CIRANO et Serban Teodoresco, Président de Preventa Inc., présentent, en une page, les principales conclusions tirées d’une analyse documentaire des recherches menées au cours des 12 dernières années et les résultats d’une étude exploratoire de 80 grandes sociétés au Québec. À lire.
« La réputation de l’entreprise est de plus en plus définie comme l’actif stratégique le plus important sur le plan de la création de valeur. L’intérêt des scientifiques à l’égard du concept de réputation de l’entreprise a contribué à quintupler le nombre d’articles et d’études évalués par des pairs au cours de la dernière décennie (Barnett et al., 2006). Pourtant, aucune définition n’est généralement acceptée.
Nous proposons une définition de la réputation de l’entreprise fondée sur des sources universitaires et des travaux d’experts : La réputation de l’entreprise est un actif incorporel acquis avec le temps et représente la valeur et la confiance accordées à l’organisation par les parties prenantes.
C’est un élément-clé qui favorise l’atteinte d’objectifs stratégiques, dont la création de valeur, la croissance rentable et l’avantage concurrentiel durable. Notre sondage, mené au Québec, montre que seulement la moitié des sociétés interrogées reconnaissent l’importance de la réputation. Aucune ne semble gérer la réputation de façon proactive… Le présent ouvrage propose un plan d’action à l’intention des sociétés désireuses d’effectuer la transition entre la gestion réactive et la gestion proactive de la réputation ».
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*Je suis en congé jusqu’à la fin septembre. Durant cette période, j’ai décidé de rééditer les billets considérés comme étant les plus pertinents par les lecteurs de mon blogue (depuis le début des activités le 19 juillet 2011).
Plusieurs administrateurs et formateurs me demandent de leur proposer un document de vulgarisation sur le sujet de la gouvernance. J’ai déjà diffusé sur mon blogue un guide à l’intention des journalistes spécialisés dans le domaine de la gouvernance des sociétés à travers le monde. Il a été publié par le Global Corporate Governance Forum et International Finance Corporation (un organisme de la World Bank) en étroite coopération avec International Center for Journalists. Je n’ai encore rien vu de plus complet et de plus pertinent sur la meilleure manière d’appréhender les multiples problématiques reliées à la gouvernance des entreprises mondiales. La direction de Global Corporate Governance Forum m’a fait parvenir le document en français le 14 février.
Ce guide est un outil pédagogique indispensable pour acquérir une solide compréhension des diverses facettes de la gouvernance des sociétés. Les auteurs ont multiplié les exemples de problèmes d’éthiques et de conflits d’intérêts liés à la conduite des entreprises mondiales. On apprend aux journalistes économiques – et à toutes les personnes préoccupées par la saine gouvernance – à raffiner les investigations et à diffuser les résultats des analyses effectuées. Je vous recommande fortement de lire le document, mais aussi de le conserver en lieu sûr car il est fort probable que vous aurez l’occasion de vous en servir.
Vous trouverez ci-dessous quelques extraits de l’introduction à l’ouvrage.
« This Guide is designed for reporters and editors who already have some experience covering business and finance. The goal is to help journalists develop stories that examine how a company is governed, and spot events that may have serious consequences for the company’s survival, shareholders and stakeholders. Topics include the media’s role as a watchdog, how the board of directors functions, what constitutes good practice, what financial reports reveal, what role shareholders play and how to track down and use information shedding light on a company’s inner workings. Journalists will learn how to recognize “red flags,” or warning signs, that indicate whether a company may be violating laws and rules. Tips on reporting and writing guide reporters in developing clear, balanced, fair and convincing stories.
Three recurring features in the Guide help reporters apply “lessons learned” to their own “beats,” or coverage areas:
– Reporter’s Notebook: Advise from successful business journalists
– Story Toolbox: How and where to find the story ideas
– What Do You Know? Applying the Guide’s lessons
Each chapter helps journalists acquire the knowledge and skills needed to recognize potential stories in the companies they cover, dig out the essential facts, interpret their findings and write clear, compelling stories:
What corporate governance is, and how it can lead to stories. (Chapter 1, What’s good governance, and why should journalists care?)
How understanding the role that the board and its committees play can lead to stories that competitors miss. (Chapter 2, The all-important board of directors)
Shareholders are not only the ultimate stakeholders in public companies, but they often are an excellent source for story ideas. (Chapter 3, All about shareholders)
Understanding how companies are structured helps journalists figure out how the board and management interact and why family-owned and state-owned enterprises (SOEs), may not always operate in the best interests of shareholders and the public. (Chapter 4, Inside family-owned and state-owned enterprises)
Regulatory disclosures can be a rich source of exclusive stories for journalists who know where to look and how to interpret what they see. (Chapter 5, Toeing the line: regulations and disclosure)
Reading financial statements and annual reports — especially the fine print — often leads to journalistic scoops. (Chapter 6, Finding the story behind the numbers)
Developing sources is a key element for reporters covering companies. So is dealing with resistance and pressure from company executives and public relations directors. (Chapter 7, Writing and reporting tips)
Each chapter ends with a section on Sources, which lists background resources pertinent to that chapter’s topics. At the end of the Guide, a Selected Resources section provides useful websites and recommended reading on corporate governance. The Glossary defines terminology used in covering companies and corporate governance ».
*Je suis en congé jusqu’à la fin septembre. Durant cette période, j’ai décidé de rééditer les billets considérés comme étant les plus pertinents par les lecteurs de mon blogue (depuis le début des activités le 19 juillet 2011).
Selon une enquête menée par Imagine Canada auprès d’organismes à buts non lucratif et bénévoles et rapportée dans la revue MAG | HEC MONTREAL, le Québec compterait 46 000 OBNL. Ce secteur représente des revenus annuels de l’ordre de 25 milliards de dollars et regroupe 470 000 travailleurs salariés. Il s’agit d’un secteur économique d’une importance vitale pour la société québécoise et qui croît à une grande vitesse, étant donné la tendance des gouvernements à prendre de moins en moins de place dans la gestion des organisations.
Il n’est donc pas étonnant de constater l’intérêt grandissant accordé à la gouvernance des OBNL. L’article ci-dessous, publié par Lucy P. Marcus dans le fil de LinkedIn le 7 décembre 2012, donne beaucoup d’informations pertinentes sur la nécessité de mettre en place des conseils d’administration possèdant l’expérience, l’indépendance, la diversité et les habiletés requises pour bien gérer les actifs de l’entreprise.
« A good board can be hugely benefiecial to the stability, growth and effectiveness of a non-profit. Ons the other hand, a bad or self-indulgent board can be a time-consuming distraction or a drag on scarce resources. In the worst cases, it can allow the abuse of funds and trust on a large scale. Non-profits come in all shapes and sizes.
Some are small niche organizations that come from the passion of one or two people and have limited resources. Others are large, complex organizations with significant donations and operating costs that rival many global corporations. No matter the size or scope, the principles behind the board’s responsibilities are the same. »
*Je suis en congé jusqu’à la fin septembre. Durant cette période, j’ai décidé de rééditer les billets considérés comme étant les plus pertinents par les lecteurs de mon blogue (depuis le début des activités le 19 juillet 2011).
Vous trouverez, ci-dessous, un extrait de l’excellent billet publié par Hélène Solignac, associée de Rivoli Consulting en charge de l’activité Gouvernance d’entreprise (France). L’auteure présente les résultats d’une étude conduite par HEC, Polytechnique et le BCG auprès d’une cinquantaine de grandes entreprises françaises.
Il me semble que les constats dégagés sont tout à fait transposables aux entreprises québécoises; la gouvernance des entreprises familiales et des PME est plus complexe que l’on est porté à croire ! Le Collège des administrateurs de sociétés(CAS) de l’Université Laval a d’ailleurs mis sur pied une formation intensive de deux jours sur la Gouvernance des PME.
Les chercheurs ont cherché à « mettre en évidence les facteurs-clés transposables à des entreprises non familiales, en particulier, la priorité donnée au long terme et à la pérennité de l’entreprise, le rôle central des valeurs, conjuguées avec la capacité à innover et à explorer de nouvelles opportunités sont des caractéristiques largement partagées par les entreprises familiales. Les valeurs très fortes qui trouvent leur origine dans la famille et son histoire, sont incarnées par les dirigeants familiaux et intériorisées par tous les membres de l’entreprise. Elles fondent une vision long terme partagée, mais aussi un système d’obligations et d’attentes réciproques.
Bien sûr, l’entreprise familiale n’est pas un modèle en soi : les exemples sont nombreux de successions et de transmissions mal gérées, d’isolement de dirigeants autoritaires ou de dissensions familiales préjudiciables à l’entreprise. Les risques liés à une gouvernance mal organisée et au non respect des actionnaires minoritaires, à des héritiers peu préparés, à une trop forte résistance au changement ne sont pas toujours bien analysés.
Néanmoins, à l’heure de la “corporate governance”, où la gestion des managers professionnels est critiquée pour sa vision court-termiste, la recherche de profits immédiats, les risques excessifs et non maîtrisés – comme les échecs d’opérations de croissance externe du fait de l’attention insuffisante portée à l’intégration – ; où l’on déplore le manque d’éthique, la perte de sens au travail, la promotion de individualisme au détriment de la recherche de coopération, ces pistes de réflexion sont les bienvenues ».
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*Je suis en congé jusqu’à la fin septembre. Durant cette période, j’ai décidé de rééditer les billets considérés comme étant les plus pertinents par les lecteurs de mon blogue (depuis le début des activités le 19 juillet 2011).
Vous trouverez, ci-dessous, une présentation Power Point que Richard Leblanc a livrée à la conférence annuelle de la Canadian Society of Corporate Secretaries, le 21 août 2013 à Halifax, NS.
Cette présentation aborde tous les points chauds dans le domaine de la rémunération des hauts dirigeants. Richard a eu la générosité de mettre cette présentation en ligne via le groupe de discussion Boards & Advisors. Il s’agit d’une mine d’information pour toute personne intéressée par l’influence de la gouvernance sur les rémunérations des dirigeants.
President Barack Obama and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner announce new limits on executive compensation. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Si vous êtes intéressés par certains aspects plus spécifiques de ces questions, je suis assuré qu’il se fera un plaisir de vous donner de plus amples informations. Voici un résumé des 10 thèmes abordés dans cette présentation. Bonne lecture.
1. Red flags and best practices;
2. Shareholder engagement and activism;
3. Changes to executive compensation;
4. Compensation of oversight functions (Canada, FSB);
5. Internal pay equity (coming in August);
6. Independent director compensation: Case;
7. Incorporating LT NF metrics into compensation: Case;
Denis Lefort, CPA, CA, CIA, CRMA, expert-conseil / Gouvernance, Audit interne, m’a fait parvenir le projet de référentiel très utile aux personnes intéressées par l’audit interne. Pour ceux qui n’en auraient pas encore pris connaissance, l’Institut des auditeurs internes (IAI) a publié un document de type Flash Alert en lien avec une initiative mondiale du IIRC (International Integrated Reporting Council) portant sur un cadre international de communication intégrée de l’information.
Le document joint de l’IAI résume les enjeux et l’opportunité que cela représente pour les auditeurs internes.
La 2e version préliminaire du cadre de l’IIRC a été publiée en avril 2013 et la version finale est prévue pour décembre 2013. Comme vous le constaterez, ce cadre déborde largement les informations financières pour inclure aussi par exemple celles liées à la propriété intellectuelle, les opérations, et les RH.
The Rewarding Profession of Internal Audit / Corporate Management (Photo credit: danielleherner)
Pour information, je vous joins aussi la version française du cadre préliminaire proposé par l’IIRC, lequel est entré dans une phase de consultation pour commentaires.
Voici les résultats d’une étude empirique réalisée par un groupe de chercheurs éminents : Lucian Bebchuk, Harvard Law School, Alon Brav, Duke University, et Wei Jiang, Columbia Business School, et publiée dans le Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation le 19 août 2013. Selon les auteurs, cette étude démontre que les activités des investisseurs activistes (Hedge Funds) n’ont pas d’effets négatifs sur les intérêts à long-terme des entreprises et de leurs actionnaires.
Les résultats de l’étude indiquent que les comportements des actionnaires activistes ont même des effets positifs à long terme, contrairement aux prétentions de plusieurs opposants de ces activités insuffisamment règlementées. Nous avons souvent discuté de cette problématique sur notre blogue mais c’est la première fois que nous présentons les résultats d’une recherche scientifique aussi importante.
Je vous invite à prendre connaissance du résumé de cette étude en consultant le document ci-dessous.
Il y a deux grands courants de pensée qui divisent le monde de la gouvernance et qui s’opposent “royalement” :
(1) celui des investisseurs activistes qui tentent de tirer profit des failles perçues dans les orientations et la gestion des grandes entreprises cotées, en investissant massivement dans celles-ci et en proposant des changements radicaux de stratégies (fusion, restructuration, recapitalisation, contestation des PCD et des membres de conseils, etc…).
Selon ce groupe, les actionnaires sont rois et on se doit d’intervenir lorsque les entreprises ne sont pas gérées efficacement.
(2) celui des défenseurs de l’autorité des C.A. dans leurs rôles de fiduciaires, représentant les intérêts des actionnaires et des autres parties prenantes.
Selon ce groupe, ce sont les conseils d’administration qui prennent les décisions de nature stratégique en fonction de l’intérêt à long terme des entreprises. Les autorités règlementaires doivent donc intervenir pour restreindre les activités des investissements “court-termistes” […].
Voici un document émanant d’une présentation d’Yvan Allaire* à la conférence nationale de l’Institut des administrateurs de sociétés (Institute of Corporate Directors) à Toronto le 22 mai 2013 dont le thème était Shareholder Activism: Short vs. Long-termism. Dans son article, l’auteur prend une position affirmative en tentant d’expliquer les comportements court-termistes des actionnaires (investisseurs) activistes. Ce document mérite que l’on s’y penche pour réfléchir à trois questions fondamentales en gouvernance. Les questions soulevées dans le document sont les suivantes :
(1) La gestion avec une perspective court-termiste représente-t-elle un problème sérieux ?
(2) Les investisseurs activistes sont-ils des joueurs court-termistes dont les actions ont des conséquences négatives pour les entreprises à long terme ?
(3) Les conseils d’administration des sociétés canadiennes doivent-ils être mieux protégés des actions des investisseurs activistes et des offres d’achat hostiles ? […]
J’ai choisi de partager avec les lecteurs un article de Holly J. Gregory, associé de Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, paru sur le blogue de Harvard Law School Forum (HLSF) on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation. Ce billet présente un solide argumentaire en faveur de la préservation d’un juste équilibre entre les principaux acteurs de la gouvernance : les actionnaires, les administrateurs, les managers, les conseillers et les autorités règlementaires.
Il est clair que le conseil d’administration, élu par les actionnaires, a toujours la responsabilité de l’orientation, de la surveillance et du suivi de l’organisation. Mais l’environnement de la gouvernance a changé et les actionnaires peuvent maintenant se référer aux avis exprimés par les firmes spécialisées de conseils en procuration pour mieux faire entendre leurs voix.L’auteur tente de clarifier les rôles de tous les acteurs en insistant sur les équilibres fragiles à préserver dans la gouvernance des sociétés […]
Dans ce billet, nous présentons une solide prise de position sur le comportement des fonds activistes (“hedge funds”) par Martin Lipton, partenaire fondateur de la firme Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, et publiée dans Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance. L’auteur montre comment les fonds activistes peuvent souvent agir en fonction d’intérêts contraires aux actionnaires. L’auteur soulève une multitude de questions qui doivent trouver des réponses adéquates […]
Voici une excellente revue, parue dans Bloomberg Businessweek, au sujet de l’interventionnisme croissant des investisseurs institutionnels dans les décisions des conseils d’administration. On assiste à un changement significatif du comportement des grands investisseurs qui se joignent de plus en plus aux groupes d’actionnaires activistes pour exiger des changements dans le management de l’entreprise, plus particulièrement dans la conduite du PCD (CEO).
Les PCD sont de plus en plus conscients de l’influence significative des actionnaires et des grands investisseurs dans la gestion de l’entreprise; ils apprennent à reconnaître qui est le réel patron de l’organisation (le C.A., de plus en plus influencé par l’activisme des actionnaires).
L’article résume la situation de la manière suivante : “As big investors press Boards, the number of directors who failed to win majorities in shareholder votes has almost tripled since 2006″. […]
Dans son blogue, Governance Gateway, Richard Leblanc exprime son point de vue (1) sur les raisons qui incitent les actionnaires activistes à intervenir dans les activités des entreprises, et (2) sur le concept d’actionnariat au sens large. L’auteur tente de répondre à plusieurs questions fondamentales :
Quelles sont les responsabilités des conseils d’administration dans les cas d’activisme des actionnaires et d’offres d’achat non-sollicitées ?
Quel est le devoir du C.A. envers les actionnaires … et envers les parties prenantes ?
Comment définir la “valeur” des actionnaires ?
Quelle est la place des consultants dans ce processus ?
Autant de questions auxquelles l’auteur tente d’apporter des réponses sensés. Ce sont des prises de positions qui peuvent avoir de grandes incidences sur le modèle de gouvernance existant ! […]
Le Conference Board publie un compte rendu d’experts sur l’activisme des actionnaires en période d’incertitude. The recent Governance Watch webcast, Shareholder Activism in Uncertain Times, raised important questions for both management and boards to consider in the midst of an economic climate that is making many companies particularly. […]
Ci-dessous un extrait de l’article de Bebchuket al.
We recently completed an empirical study, The Long-Term Effects of Hedge Fund Activism, that tests the empirical validity of a claim that has been playing a central role in debates on corporate governance – the claim that interventions by activist shareholders, and in particular activist hedge funds, have an adverse effect on the long-term interests of companies and their shareholders. While this “myopic activists” claim has been regularly invoked and has had considerable influence, its supporters have thus far failed to back it up with evidence. Our study presents a comprehensive emp irical investigation of this claim. Our findings have important policy implications for ongoing policy debates on corporate governance and the rights and role of shareholders…
… Our study uses a dataset consisting of the full universe of approximately 2,000 interventions by activist hedge funds during the period 1994–2007. We identify for each activist effort the month (the intervention month) in which the activist initiative was first publicly disclosed (usually through the filing of a Schedule 13D). Using the data on operating performance and stock returns of public companies during the period 1991-2012, we track the operating performance and stock returns for companies during a long period – five years – following the intervention month. We also examine the three-year period that precedes activist interventions and that follows activists’ departure.
Hauser Hall (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Starting with operating performance, we find that operating performance improves following activist interventions and there is no evidence that the improved performance comes at the expense of performance later on. During the third, fourth, and fifth year following the start of an activist intervention, operating performance tends to be better, not worse, than during the pre-intervention period. Thus, during the long, five-year time window that we examine, the declines in operating performance asserted by supporters of the myopic activism claim are not found in the data. We also find that activists tend to target companies that are underperforming relative to industry peers at the time of the intervention, not well-performing ones.
We then turn to stock returns following the initial stock price spike that is well-known to accompany activist interventions. We first find that, consistent with the results obtained with respect to pre-intervention operating performance, targets of activists have negative abnormal returns during the three years preceding the intervention. We then proceed to examine whether, as supporters of the myopic activism claim believe, the initial stock price reflects inefficient market pricing that fails to reflect the long-term costs of the activist intervention and is thus followed by stock return underperformance in the long term.
In investigating the presence of negative abnormal returns during this period, we employ three standard methods used by financial economists for detecting stock return underperformance. In particular, the study examines: first, whether the returns to targeted companies were systematically lower than what would be expected given standard asset pricing models; second, whether the returns to targeted companies were lower than those of “matched” firms that are similar in terms of size and book to market; and, third, whether a portfolio based on taking positions in activism targets and holding them for five years underperforms relative to its risk characteristics. Using each of these methods, we find no evidence of the asserted reversal of fortune during the five-year period following the intervention. The long-term underperformance asserted by supporters of the myopic activism claim, and the resulting losses to long-term shareholders resulting from activist interventions, are not found in the data.
We also analyze whether activists cash out their stakes before negative stock returns occur and impose losses on remaining long-term shareholders. Because activist hedge funds have been documented to deliver adequate returns to their own investors, such a pattern is a necessary condition for long-term shareholders being made worse off by activist interventions. We therefore examine whether targets of activist hedge funds experience negative abnormal returns in the three years after an activist discloses that its holdings fell below the 5% threshold that subjects investors to significant disclosure requirements. Again using the three standard methods for detecting the existence of abnormal stock returns, we find no evidence that long-term shareholders experience negative stock returns during the three years following the partial or full cashing out of an activist’s stake.
We next turn to examine the two subsets of activist interventions that are most resisted and criticized – first, interventions that lower or constrain long-term investments by enhancing leverage, beefing up shareholder payouts, or reducing investments and, second, adversarial interventions employing hostile tactics. In both cases, interventions are followed by improvements in operating performance during the five-year period following the intervention, and no evidence is found for the adverse long-term effects asserted by opponents.
Finally, we examine whether activist interventions render targeted companies more vulnerable to economic shocks. In particular, we examine whether companies targeted by activist interventions during the years preceding the financial crisis were hit more in the subsequent crisis. We find no evidence that pre-crisis interventions by activists were associated with greater declines in operating performance or higher incidence of financial distress during the crisis.
Our findings that the data does not support the claims and empirical predictions of those holding the myopic activism view have significant implications for ongoing policy debates. Going forward, policymakers and institutional investors should not accept the validity of assertions that interventions by hedge funds are followed by long-term adverse consequences for companies and their long-term shareholders. The use of such claims as a basis for limiting shareholder rights and involvement should be rejected.
*Lucian Bebchuk is Professor of Law, Economics, and Finance at Harvard Law School. Alon Brav is Professor of Finance at Duke University. Wei Jiang, Professor of Finance at Columbia Business School. This post is based on their study, The Long-Term Effects of Hedge Fund Activism, available here. An op-ed about the article published in the Wall Street Journal summarizing the results of the study is available here.
McKinsey is the world’s largest and most profitable management consulting firm, as well one of the most difficult places to get hired. Over its 87-year existence it’s had a massive impact on the U.S. economy according to « The Firm, » a forthcoming book by Duff McDonald.
In a New York Observer column, pointed out by Mike Dang at The Billfold, McDonald argues that the massive modern-day gap between executive and worker pay has its origin with the consulting firm.
It’s a fascinating story that all started with General Motors commissioning a study on executive pay from McKinsey consultant Arch Patton. He found that from 1939 to 1950, hourly employee pay more than doubled, but top management pay went up only 35%.
The study, published in the Harvard Business Review, became a series and turned national attention toward executive compensation, promoting the idea that higher pay and bonuses were the lever to attract and retain top executives.
Patton became a superstar, hired by managers who were not surprisingly interested in hearing they were underpaid. McKinsey’s CEO apparently thought this type of consulting was beneath the firm, but wasn’t about to turn down the money.
« For several years, Mr. Patton personally accounted for almost 10 percent of the firm’s billings, » McDonald writes. « At the end of the war, only 18 percent of companies in the country had bonus plans. By 1960, about 60 percent of them did. »
In 1961 came the books « Men, Money and Motivation: Executive Compensation as an Instrument of Leadership » and « What Is an Executive Worth?«
One McKinsey consultant told McDonald that Patton wrote « the same article [26] times for the Harvard Business Review. »
Because of its popularity and McKinsey’s influence, the idea became an entrenched philosophy, as did the concept that as a company grows, so should CEO pay.
While Patton’s compensation philosophy started with rigorous analysis of performance, soon it took on a life of its own, with executive pay spiraling higher and higher, while worker pay was left to languish.
Here’s where we are today, according to a report by The State Of Working America, a project of the Economic Policy Institute:
The AFL-CIO puts the number even higher, saying that the average Fortune 500 CEO makes 354 times the average wage of their employees. Some executives make 1,000 times more.
Of course, McKinsey and Patton weren’t the only factor. Bull markets and economic expansion help push pay upwards and encourage investors to look the other way — and once it moves up, pay is slow to move back down. Meanwhile, slack labor markets and weak growth prospects help to explain stagnant wages.
Regardless, McKinsey and Patton may have been a major driver in the gap between CEO and employee wages exploding by a factor of 10 since the middle of the century.
L’auteur de ce billet, Eugene Fram*, tente de décrire comment le conseil d’administration d’une OBNL peut tracer une ligne entre (1) la confiance et la liberté accordée à son PDG et (2) le rôle d’orientation et de surveillance qui lui échoit.
C’est un article pertinent car on sait que les OBNL ont souvent des problèmes à distinguer les activités qui relèvent du conseil d’administration de celles qui relèvent du PDG (CEO). En bref, les membres du C.A. doivent se questionner sur l’étendue du pouvoir à consentir à leur PDG, et savoir quand trop de pouvoir est préjudiciable à l’organisation. Pour bien circonscrire les rôles, il est essentiel que les membres du conseil soient indépendants de la direction de l’organisation.
Les recherches montrent que les PDG qui agissent sans balises précises de la part de leurs conseils d’administration sont susceptibles d’abuser de leur position en s’octroyant des bénéfices personnels ou en prenant des risques excessifs.
David Larcker and Brian Tanya**, Stanford University professors, have come to the following conclusions about CEO power and raise some pertinent questions about the role of the board, based on research mainly centered on for-profit organizations. The research literature clearly shows that having a powerful CEO creates the potential for him or her to abuse this position to extract personal benefits or engage in excessive risky activities. At the same time, the research also shows that (CE0) power is often critical to the successful completion of tasks and the achievement of corporate objectives (and nonprofit missions). To this end, powerful CEOs can ultimately be a success or a failure. Are shareholders (stakeholders of nonprofits) better or worse off with a powerful CEO?
Voici un ensemble de responsabilités qui relèvent du conseil d’administration. Il est important d’en discuter en C.A. et de s’assurer que le PDG est bien au courant de celles-ci. L’auteur insiste également sur la nécessité d’établir une solide relation de confiance entre le conseil et le PDG de l’OBNL. Bonne lecture !
• Establishes long-term organizational objective and outcomes.
• Sets overall policy affecting strategies designed to achieve objectives, outcomes and impacts.
• Employs the CEO
Red Cross Memorial (Photo credit: cliff1066™)
(2) Judges Management Actions
• Robustly evaluates short-term (annual) and long-term performance of management
• Determines whether policies and strategies are being carried out, whether outcomes and impacts are being achieved
(3) Approves management actions
• Critically reviews, approves or disapproves proposals in policy and strategic areas (for example, major capital needs or expenditures and major contracts)
• Provides formal recognition and acceptance of executive decisions when related to operational actions.
(4) Advises management
• Acts in an advisory or consultative capacity on operations when sought by management
(5) Receives information from management
• Regularly receives reports on the organization (e.g., performance, program development, external factors, concerns)
(6) Acts as a public, community or industry resource to management
• Keeps the organization attuned to the external environment in which it operates
* Eugene Fram & Vicki Brown (2011), “Policy vs. Paper Clips: How using the corporate model makes a nonprofit board more efficient and effective.” http://amzn.to/eu7nQl
**David Larcker et Brian Tanya, « Is a Powerful CEO Good or Bad for Shareholders ?« , Stanford Closer Look Series, 13 november 2012.
Il y a 9 jours, j’ai lancé une discussion dans le groupe Boards & Advisors de LinkedIn sur la problématique liée au versement de bonis aux hauts dirigeants des sociétés cotées. J’avais alors proposé la lecture d’un article d’Henry Mintzberg* paru le 30 novembre 2009 et publié dans le Wall Street Journal le 12 novembre 2012 : No More Executive Bonuses !
Ce partage a donné lieu à une discussion extrordinairement musclée dans le groupe de discussion Boards & Advisors de LinkedIn que je vous invite à consulter afin de saisir toute la gamme des arguments invoqués, soit pour justifier l’utilisation des bonis, soit pour proposer de nouvelles variables à tenir en ligne de compte, soit, carrément, pour vilipender les tenants de cette approche trop souvent abusive. On peut dire que l’article de Mintzberg a, encore une fois, suscité de vives réactions.
Dans son article, Mintzberg critique sévèrement l’utilisation de cette façon de rémunérer la direction des entreprises et recommande l’abolition, pure et simple, des primes au rendement et des autres bonis versés aux hauts dirigeants. Cet article me semble toujours d’actualité.
L’auteur donne cinq raisons qui guident le comportement des hauts dirigeants lorsque le système de rémunération comporte des bonis. Il suggère que le système est basé sur de fausses hypothèses, notamment :
(1) A company’s health is represented by its financial measures alone—even better, by just the price of its stock;
(2) Performance measures, whether short or long term, represent the true strength of the company;
(3) The CEO, with a few other senior executives, is primarily responsible for the company’s performance.
Je vous invite à lire l’article de Mintzberg, ci-dessous, puis à consulter le lien vous menant au fil de discussion mentionné plus haut.
Ce billet a une grande valeur pédagogique; n’hésitez pas à faire connaître votre point de vue. Bonne lecture.
Let’s end corporate bonuses, says Henry Mintzberg, a professor at the Desautels Faculty of Management at McGill University. Executive bonuses, especially stock and option grants, are a form of legal corruption that has been bringing down the global … The problem isn’t that they are poorly designed. The problem is that they exist.
… These days, it seems, there is no shortage of recommendations for fixing the way bonuses are paid to executives at big public companies. Well, I have my own recommendation: Scrap the whole thing. Don’t pay any bonuses. Nothing.
This may sound extreme. But when you look at the way the compensation game is played—and the assumptions that are made by those who want to reform it—you can come to no other conclusion. The system simply can’t be fixed. Executive bonuses—especially in the form of stock and option grants—represent the most prominent form of legal corruption that has been undermining our large corporations and bringing down the global economy. Get rid of them and we will all be better off for it.
Mintzberg Speaking (Photo credit: Daphne Depasse)
The failings of the current system—and the executives who live by it—are painfully obvious. Although these executives like to think of themselves as leaders, when it comes to their pay practices, many of them haven’t been demonstrating leadership at all. Instead they’ve been acting like gamblers—except that the games they play are hopelessly rigged in their favor.
First, they play with other people’s money—the stockholders’, not to mention the livelihoods of their employees and the sustainability of their institutions.
Second, they collect not when they win so much as when it appears that they are winning—because their company’s stock price has gone up and their bonuses have kicked in. In such a game, you make sure to have your best cards on the table, while you keep the rest hidden in your hand.
Third, they also collect when they lose—it’s called a « golden parachute. » Some gamblers.
Fourth, some even collect just for drawing cards—for example, receiving a special bonus when they have signed a merger, before anyone can know if it will work out. Most mergers don’t.
And fifth, on top of all this, there are chief executives who collect merely for not leaving the table. This little trick is called a « retention bonus »—being paid for staying in the game! …
Vous trouverez, ci-dessous, un billet publié par Richard Leblanc* sur son blogue Governance Gateway. L’auteur a interrogé un nombre important d’acteurs de la scène de la gouvernance (investisseurs activistes, gestionnaires de fonds privés, administrateurs, CEO) et a tenu compte des points de vue émis par plusieurs groupes d’experts dans le domaine :
« Advisory work with regulators; assessments of leading boards; expertwitness work; academic and practitioner literature; current and emerging regulations; director conferences and webinars; lectures the author has delivered to the Institute of Corporate Directors and Directors College in Canada; discussions in the author’s LinkedIn group, Board and Advisors; and research being conducted with the author and Henry D. Wolfe on building high performance public company boards ».
Il s’agit d’une proposition de changement à trois niveaux :
(1) Renforcement du rôle du C.A. en matière de création de valeur;
Je vous invite à consulter cette liste afin d’avoir un aperçu des types de changements proposés. Vos commentaires sont toujours les bienvenus. Bonne lecture.
La longueur de l’exercice du mandat d’un président et chef de direction (PCD) nuit-elle à la performance ? Il semble bien que oui selon l’étude de Xueming Luo, Vamsi K. Kanuri et Michelle Andrews, publiée dans HBR The Magazine.
Les implications pour les C.A. sont discutées dans l’article. Et vous, qu’en pensez-vous?
It’s a familiar cycle: A CEO takes office, begins gaining knowledge and experience, and is soon launching initiatives that boost the bottom line. Fast-forward a decade, and the same executive is risk-averse and slow to adapt to change—and the company’s performance is on the decline. The pattern is so common that many refer to the “seasons” of a CEO’s tenure, analogous to the seasons of the year.
New research examines the causes of this cycle and shows that it’s more nuanced than that. We found that CEO tenure affects performance through its impact on two groups of stakeholders—employees and customers—and has different effects on each. The longer a CEO serves, the more the firm-employee dynamic improves. But an extended term strengthens customer ties only for a time, after which the relationship weakens and the company’s performance diminishes, no matter how united and committed the workforce is.
We studied 356 U.S. companies from 2000 to 2010. We measured CEO tenure and calculated the strength of the firm-employee relationship each year (by assessing such things as retirement benefits and layoffs) and the strength of the firm-customer relationship (by assessing such things as product quality and safety). We then measured the magnitude and volatility of stock returns. All this allowed us to arrive at an optimal tenure length: 4.8 years.
The underlying reasons for the pattern, we believe, have to do with how CEOs learn. Previous research has shown that different learning styles prevail at different stages of the CEO life cycle. Early on, when new executives are getting up to speed, they seek information in diverse ways, turning to both external and internal company sources. This deepens their relationships with customers and employees alike.
But as CEOs accumulate knowledge and become entrenched, they rely more on their internal networks for information, growing less attuned to market conditions. And, because they have more invested in the firm, they favor avoiding losses over pursuing gains. Their attachment to the status quo makes them less responsive to vacillating consumer preferences.
These findings have several implications for organizations. Boards should be watchful for changes in the firm-customer relationship. They should be aware that long-tenured CEOs may be skilled at employee relations but less adept at responding to the marketplace; these leaders may be great motivators but weak strategists, unifying workers around a failing course of action, for example. Finally, boards should structure incentive plans to draw heavily on consumer and market metrics in the late stages of their top executives’ terms. This will motivate CEOs to maintain strong customer relationships and to continue gathering vital market information firsthand.
*Xueming Luo is a professor at the University of Texas at Arlington and a distinguished honorary professor at Fudan University, in China. Vamsi K. Kanuri and Michelle Andrews are PhD candidates.
Interventionnisme des investisseurs activistes VS défenseurs de l’autorité des C.A. | Un débat de fond
Il y a deux grands courants de pensée qui divisent le monde de la gouvernance et qui s’opposent « royalement ».
(1) celui des investisseurs activistes qui tentent de tirer profit des failles perçues dans les orientations et la gestion des grandes entreprises cotées, en investissant massivement dans celles-ci et en proposant des changements radicaux de stratégies (fusion, restructuration, recapitalisation, contestation des PCD et des membres de conseils, etc…).
Selon ce groupe, les actionnaires sont rois et on se doit d’intervenir lorsque les entreprises ne sont pas gérées efficacement.
(2) celui des défenseurs de l’autorité des C.A. dans leurs rôles de fiduciaires, représentant les intérêts des actionnaires et des autres parties prenantes.
Selon ce groupe, ce sont les conseils d’administration qui prennent les décisions de nature stratégique en fonction de l’intérêt à long terme des entreprises. Les autorités règlementaires doivent donc intervenir pour restreindre les activités des investissements « court-termistes ».
L’article de Nathan Vardi, publié dans Forbes le 6 août 2013, fait le point sur la situation qui règne dans le monde des investissements à caractère « actif » (hedge funds). Il présente, selon moi, singulièrement bien les arguments invoqués par chaque partie.
Quel est votre position en regard de ces deux conceptions : celui des actionnaires activistes, représenté par Carl Icahn, ou celui des gardiens de la bonne gouvernance, représenté par Martin Lipton ?
Voici quelques extraits de l’article. Veuillez lire l’article de M. Vardi pour plus de détails. Bonne lecture.
Once disparaged as greenmailers and corporate raiders who pillage for quick profit, activist investors have become rock stars and rebranded themselves as advocates of all shareholders, taking on the kind of shareholder watchdog role that institutional investors like big pension funds and mutual funds have long resisted. They are not done rebranding themselves. Peltz, whose Trian Management oversees $6.5 billion, describes his investment style not as activism but as “constructivism.” Larry Robbins, who runs $6 billion hedge fund firm Glenview Capital Management, one of the best-performing hedge funds over the last 18 months, wants to be seen as a “suggestivist.” The idea is to appear less threatening while trying to do things like replace the management and board of directors of a company, like Robbins is trying to do at hospital company Health Management Associates. “In Hollywood terms, we are more Mr. Spock than William Wallace,” Robbins recently said. “I get a lot more out of these CEOs by not embarrassing them publicly, by not being viewed as trying to nail their scalp to the wall,” Barry Rosenstein, the prominent activist investor who runs $5 billion Jana Partners, told The Wall Street Journal.
Icahn Lab Conference Room (Photo credit: Joe Shlabotnik)
Others, however, have a different way of describing what these guys are up to. “In what can only be considered a form of extortion, activist hedge funds are preying on American corporations to create short-term increases in the market price of their stock at the expense of long-term value,” famed lawyer Martin Lipton wrote earlier this year. “The consequences of radical stockholder-centric governance and short-termism prompt a series of questions that cry out for re-examination.” Lipton, the most prominent defender of corporate boards in their battles with activist investors and the inventor of the so-called poison pill defense tactic, even suggests that the new wave of activist investors might be responsible for “a very significant part of American unemployment and a failure to achieve a GDP growth rate sufficient to pay for reasonable entitlements.”
Lipton has been blasting activist investors for decades. But last week activist investing went Hollywood as George Clooney attacked Dan Loeb, who has been criticizing the management of Sony Pictures Entertainment as part of his effort to get Sony to spin off its U.S. entertainment assets. “[Loeb] calls himself an activist investor, and I would call him a carpet bagger,” Clooney told Deadline.com. “What he’s doing is scaring studios and pushing them to make decisions from a place of fear. Why is he buying stock like crazy if he’s so down on things? He’s trying to manipulate the market.” Clooney said activist hedge fund managers like Loeb don’t create jobs, unlike the movie industry that is a significant U.S. exporter…
Nevertheless, activist-investor efforts to drive shareholder value at companies seem to be all over the financial markets. The renaissance is best typified by billionaire investor Carl Icahn, who is going stronger than ever. With more money at his disposal than ever before, Icahn, now 77, has been a huge player in financial markets in recent months. He has vigorously taken on Michael Dell’s effort to take Dell private, played a role in kicking Aubrey McClendon out of Chesapeake Energy, and is at the center of the billionaire brawl over Herbalife. He has enjoyed rich recent successes from companies ranging from CVR Energy to Netflix. His Icahn Enterprises has seen its stock rise by 57% this year. Icahn hasn’t changed his tune in years and recently argued that “what I do is good for America.”…
Activist players are continuing to push the envelope and bringing their brand of investing to new industry and geographic frontiers. Dan Loeb, whose Third Point hedge fund has been one of the best-performing hedge funds over the last 18 months or so, stormed Silicon Valley, sparking sweeping changes to the flailing Internet giant Yahoo’s management and making about $1 billion in realized and paper profits. Now, he’s off to Japan, trying to shake things up at Sony in a country that has long resisted reform at many levels. Loeb is not the only brash American to attack a foreign company and sometimes these guys even manage to win broad support for their efforts in foreign countries. Not long ago, William Ackman struck at Canadian Pacific Railway and his intervention has helped spark a huge run-up in the stock. The business magazine of Canada’s authoritative Globe and Mail newspaper didn’t call him a carpet bagger, rather they branded Ackman, who is not a corporate executive, “CEO of The Year.”
Il y a deux grands courants de pensée qui divisent le monde de la gouvernance et qui s’opposent « royalement ».
(1) celui des investisseurs activistes qui tentent de tirer profit des failles perçues dans les orientations et la gestion des grandes entreprises cotées, en investissant massivement dans celles-ci et en proposant des changements radicaux de stratégies (fusion, restructuration, recapitalisation, contestation des PCD et des membres de conseils, etc…).
Selon ce groupe, les actionnaires sont rois et on se doit d’intervenir lorsque les entreprises ne sont pas gérées efficacement.
(2) celui des défenseurs de l’autorité des C.A. dans leurs rôles de fiduciaires, représentant les intérêts des actionnaires et des autres parties prenantes.
Selon ce groupe, ce sont les conseils d’administration qui prennent les décisions de nature stratégique en fonction de l’intérêt à long terme des entreprises. Les autorités règlementaires doivent donc intervenir pour restreindre les activités des investissements « court-termistes ».
L’article de Nathan Vardi, publié dans Forbes le 6 août 2013, fait le point sur la situation qui règne dans le monde des investissements à caractère « actif » (hedge funds). Il présente, selon moi, singulièrement bien les arguments invoqués par chaque partie.
Quel est votre position en regard de ces deux conceptions : celui des actionnaires activistes, représenté par Carl Icahn, ou celui des gardiens de la bonne gouvernance, représenté par Martin Lipton ?
Voici quelques extraits de l’article. Veuillez lire l’article de M. Vardi pour plus de détails. Bonne lecture.
Once disparaged as greenmailers and corporate raiders who pillage for quick profit, activist investors have become rock stars and rebranded themselves as advocates of all shareholders, taking on the kind of shareholder watchdog role that institutional investors like big pension funds and mutual funds have long resisted. They are not done rebranding themselves. Peltz, whose Trian Management oversees $6.5 billion, describes his investment style not as activism but as “constructivism.” Larry Robbins, who runs $6 billion hedge fund firm Glenview Capital Management, one of the best-performing hedge funds over the last 18 months, wants to be seen as a “suggestivist.” The idea is to appear less threatening while trying to do things like replace the management and board of directors of a company, like Robbins is trying to do at hospital company Health Management Associates. “In Hollywood terms, we are more Mr. Spock than William Wallace,” Robbins recently said. “I get a lot more out of these CEOs by not embarrassing them publicly, by not being viewed as trying to nail their scalp to the wall,” Barry Rosenstein, the prominent activist investor who runs $5 billion Jana Partners, told The Wall Street Journal.
Icahn Lab Conference Room (Photo credit: Joe Shlabotnik)
Others, however, have a different way of describing what these guys are up to. “In what can only be considered a form of extortion, activist hedge funds are preying on American corporations to create short-term increases in the market price of their stock at the expense of long-term value,” famed lawyer Martin Lipton wrote earlier this year. “The consequences of radical stockholder-centric governance and short-termism prompt a series of questions that cry out for re-examination.” Lipton, the most prominent defender of corporate boards in their battles with activist investors and the inventor of the so-called poison pill defense tactic, even suggests that the new wave of activist investors might be responsible for “a very significant part of American unemployment and a failure to achieve a GDP growth rate sufficient to pay for reasonable entitlements.”
Lipton has been blasting activist investors for decades. But last week activist investing went Hollywood as George Clooney attacked Dan Loeb, who has been criticizing the management of Sony Pictures Entertainment as part of his effort to get Sony to spin off its U.S. entertainment assets. “[Loeb] calls himself an activist investor, and I would call him a carpet bagger,” Clooney told Deadline.com. “What he’s doing is scaring studios and pushing them to make decisions from a place of fear. Why is he buying stock like crazy if he’s so down on things? He’s trying to manipulate the market.” Clooney said activist hedge fund managers like Loeb don’t create jobs, unlike the movie industry that is a significant U.S. exporter…
Nevertheless, activist-investor efforts to drive shareholder value at companies seem to be all over the financial markets. The renaissance is best typified by billionaire investor Carl Icahn, who is going stronger than ever. With more money at his disposal than ever before, Icahn, now 77, has been a huge player in financial markets in recent months. He has vigorously taken on Michael Dell’s effort to take Dell private, played a role in kicking Aubrey McClendon out of Chesapeake Energy, and is at the center of the billionaire brawl over Herbalife. He has enjoyed rich recent successes from companies ranging from CVR Energy to Netflix. His Icahn Enterprises has seen its stock rise by 57% this year. Icahn hasn’t changed his tune in years and recently argued that “what I do is good for America.”…
Activist players are continuing to push the envelope and bringing their brand of investing to new industry and geographic frontiers. Dan Loeb, whose Third Point hedge fund has been one of the best-performing hedge funds over the last 18 months or so, stormed Silicon Valley, sparking sweeping changes to the flailing Internet giant Yahoo’s management and making about $1 billion in realized and paper profits. Now, he’s off to Japan, trying to shake things up at Sony in a country that has long resisted reform at many levels. Loeb is not the only brash American to attack a foreign company and sometimes these guys even manage to win broad support for their efforts in foreign countries. Not long ago, William Ackman struck at Canadian Pacific Railway and his intervention has helped spark a huge run-up in the stock. The business magazine of Canada’s authoritative Globe and Mail newspaper didn’t call him a carpet bagger, rather they branded Ackman, who is not a corporate executive, “CEO of The Year.”
Vous trouverez, ci-dessous, un document émanant d’une présentation d’Yvan Allaire* à la conférence nationale de l’Institut des administrateurs de sociétés (Institute of Corporate Directors) à Toronto le 22 mai 2013 dont le thème était Shareholder Activism: Short vs. Long-termism.
Dans son article, l’auteur prend une position affirmative en tentant d’expliquer les comportements court-termistes des actionnaires (investisseurs) activistes. Ce document, à ma connaissance, n’a pas été traduit en français mais il mérite que l’on s’y penche pour réfléchir à trois questions fondamentales en gouvernance. Les questions soulevées dans le document (traduites en français) sont les suivantes :
(1) La gestion avec une perspective court-termiste représente-t-elle un problème sérieux ?
(2) Les investisseurs activistes sont-ils des joueurs court-termistes dont les actions ont des conséquences négatives pour les entreprises à long terme ?
(3) Les conseils d’administration des sociétés canadiennes doivent-ils être mieux protégés des actions des investisseurs activistes et des offres d’achat hostiles ?
Voici quelques extraits du document ci-dessous. Je vous invite à en prendre connaissance :
Bad capitalism is finance-driven capitalism; it is capitalism without true owners, a capitalism in which corporate leaders, motivated by the carrot of lavish incentives and the stick of humiliating replacement, are singularly focused on generating short-term value for shareholders. It is a system where financial operators reap immense riches from activities of no social value.
The board members of the privatized company, often made up of general partners of the fund, are compensated at a level and in a manner hardly conceivable for board members of a publicly listed company.
Capitalism Plus retail box cover. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Board members of the newly privatized company must not be « independent » and rarely are; a majority of board members of publicly listed companies must be « independent ».
The boards of listed corporations must discharge fully all their fiduciary and legal responsibilities; that component of governance grabs a good portion of the time available to board members; privatized companies have none of these hassles and can concentrate on strategy, cash flow management, etc.
The board of a privatized companies will call directly on outside consulting firms to assess the company, its competitors and so forth, and the external consultants will report directly to the board. Now imagine that the board of a publicly listed company were to inform management that it intends to hire some firm to audit the company’s strategy and benchmark its performance. That would not fly well and would certainly create severe tensions between the board and management. Management would claim that the board is straying away from its governance role; it would contend that the company regularly gets this sort of studies and reports regularly to the board on their results, etc.
Be that as it may, a governance revolution is in the making. Novel ways of dealing with the insuperable limits of current forms of governance must be found.
Indeed, the theme of this conference could well have been « Good Capitalism versus Bad Capitalism » because short-termism and unchecked activities of speculative funds are emblematic of « bad capitalism », of the kind we must get rid.
Voici une liste des billets en gouvernance les plus populaires publiés sur mon blogue en juillet 2013. Cette liste constitue, en quelque sorte, un sondage de l’intérêt manifesté par des dizaines de milliers de personnes sur différents thèmes de la gouvernance des sociétés.
On y retrouve des points de vue très bien étayés sur les principaux sujets d’actualité suivants : la recherche de mandats au sein des conseils, la gestion de crises, les responsabilités des membres du conseil, la gouvernance des OBNL, les fondements de la gouvernance, les dysfonctions d’un C.A., la formation des administrateurs et la succession du PCD.
Séance inaugurale – Colloque Gouvernance mondiale (Photo credit: Collège des Bernardins)
En terme géographique, près du tiers des visiteurs sont de France, ou de dizaines de pays francophones, et 63 % sont d’origine canadienne. Ceux-ci trouvent leur voie sur le site principalement via LinkedIn (47 %) ou via les engins de recherche (40 %).
Vos commentaires sont toujours les bienvenus et ils sont grandement appréciés; je réponds toujours à ceux-ci. Bonne lecture !
Vous serez sûrement intéressés par les résultats de cette recherche publié par R. Christopher Small et paru dans HLS Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation. Les résultats montrent que les PCD qui se retirent ont tendance à divulguer des prévisions de profits futurs plus positives et plus optimistes que lors des divulgations des années antérieures, surtout si leur rémunération incitative est élevée et si les mécanismes de suivis par le C.A. sont faibles.
C’est un article qui montre clairement la nécessité d’avoir un conseil d’administration vigilant à l’occasion du départ d’un PCD. Vos commentaires sont les bienvenus.
Theory suggests that Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) with short horizons with their firm have weaker incentives to act in the best interest of shareholders (Smith and Watts 1982). To date, research examining the “horizon problem” focuses on whether CEOs adopt myopic investment and accounting policies in their final years in office (e.g., Dechow and Sloan 1991; Davidson et al. 2007; Kalyta 2009; Antia et al. 2010). In our paper, Forecasting Without Consequence? Evidence on the Properties of Retiring CEOs’ Forecasts of Future Earnings, forthcoming in The Accounting Review, we extend this line of research by investigating whether retiring CEOs are more likely to engage in opportunistic forecasting behavior in their terminal year relative to other years during their tenure with the firm. Specifically, we contrast the properties (issuance, frequency, news, and bias) of earnings forecasts issued by retiring CEOs during pre-terminal years (where the CEO will be in office when the associated earnings are realized) with forecasts issued by retiring CEOs during their terminal year (where the CEO will no longer be in office when the associated earnings are realized). We also examine circumstances in which opportunistic terminal-year forecasting behavior is likely to be more or less pronounced.
retirement (Photo credit: 401(K) 2013)
Our predictions are based on several incentives that arise (or increase) during retiring CEOs’ terminal year with their firm. Specifically, relative to CEOs who will continue with their firm, retiring CEOs face strong incentives to engage in opportunistic terminal-year forecasting behavior in an attempt to inflate stock prices during the period leading up to their retirement. Deliberately misleading forecasts can be used to influence stock prices. Consistent with this argument, prior work shows that managers use voluntary disclosures opportunistically to influence stock prices (Noe 1999; Aboody and Kasznik 2000; Cheng and Lo 2006; Hamm et al. 2012) and that managers use opportunistic earnings forecasts to manipulate analysts’ (Cotter et al. 2006) and investors’ perceptions (Cheng and Lo 2006; Hamm et al. 2012) in an effort to maximize the value of their stock-based compensation (Aboody and Kasznik 2000). Moreover, because SEC trading rules related to CEOs’ post-retirement security transactions are less stringent than those in effect during their tenure with the firm, post-retirement transactions can be made before the earnings associated with the opportunistic forecast are realized and with reduced regulatory scrutiny.
To test our predictions, we first identify all CEO turnover events in Execucomp from 1997 through 2009 (a total of 3,548 events). For each CEO turnover event identified, we perform detailed searches of SEC filings, executive biographies (appearing on various social media outlets such as LinkedIn, Forbes People Finder, etc.), press releases, and related disclosures to determine whether the CEO turnover was due to retirement. Our results indicate that retiring CEOs are more likely to issue forecasts of future earnings and that they issue such forecasts more frequently in their terminal year relative to other years during their tenure with the firm. Moreover, we find that retiring CEOs’ terminal-year forecasts of future earnings are more likely to convey good news and are more optimistically biased relative to pre-terminal years. Our findings, that retiring CEOs engage in opportunistic terminal-year forecasting behavior, represent a previously undocumented implication of the “horizon problem.” Furthermore, we find that opportunistic terminal-year forecasting behavior is more pronounced in the presence of higher CEO equity incentives and discretionary expenditure cuts in the terminal year, and less pronounced in the presence of stronger monitoring mechanisms (e.g., higher institutional ownership).
Our results should be of interest to market participants (e.g., investors, analysts, etc.) who use information from management earnings forecasts. However, market participants’ ability to use our evidence is contingent on their knowledge of (or ability to anticipate) a given CEO’s impending retirement. Our study should also be of interest to stakeholders (e.g., boards of directors, regulators, etc.) who seek to implement incentive mechanisms that mitigate agency conflicts. Interestingly, our results suggest that equity incentives (a tool commonly used to align incentives and minimize agency costs) can have the unintended consequence of creating or exacerbating opportunistic forecasting. Thus, CEO and firm characteristics (such as equity incentives) may have competing effects on various horizon-problem induced behaviors.
Voici un document émanant d’une présentation d’Yvan Allaire* à la conférence nationale de l’Institut des administrateurs de sociétés (Institute of Corporate Directors) à Toronto le 22 mai 2013 dont le thème était Shareholder Activism: Short vs. Long-termism. Dans son article, l’auteur prend une position affirmative en tentant d’expliquer les comportements court-termistes des actionnaires (investisseurs) activistes. Ce document mérite que l’on s’y penche pour réfléchir à trois questions fondamentales en gouvernance. Les questions soulevées dans le document sont les suivantes :
Gouvernance | Jacques Grisé 