New Yahoo election tally shows big protest vote - SAN FRANCISCO
SAN FRANCISCO - YAHOO has released a recount of the vote for its board that revealed a strong protest vote against five of nine directors, including chief executive Jerry Yang.
The Internet company said revised vote tallies showed 33.7 per cent of votes withheld for Mr Yang, also the company’s co-founder, or more than twice the opposition to his reappointment to the board in the first count.
Mr Yang has been under pressure for months over failed attempts by Microsoft to buy Yahoo and over questions about his leadership, but early results from last Friday’s shareholder vote suggested the tide was turning in his favour.
The initial tally showed 85 per cent of votes going to him.
The stunning new twist in the Yahoo saga came after one of its largest and most critical shareholders, Capital Research Global Investors, called for a probe of the shareholder vote upon finding discrepancies in the results.
Analysts were split on whether the recount, while potentially emboldening for critics, was a symbolic embarrassment to the leadership or a new threat to its power.
‘That’s a big negative vote against the Yahoo board, but it doesn’t change anything,’ RBC Capital Markets analyst Ross Sandler said. ‘It is a statement that they shouldn’t be under any illusion that their support is broad.’
‘The recount somewhat lowers the credibility of the management team,’ Sanford C.Bernstein analyst Jeffrey Lindsay said. ‘Assuming this was all a mistake, it is particularly unfortunate: Management doesn’t have the mandate they appeared to have had’ coming out of the annual meeting, he added.
Yahoo said it had been informed by the company’s inspector of elections that Broadridge Financial Solutions, a proxy voting intermediary for major investors, had made significant errors in reporting votes at its annual shareholder meeting.
Three other directors, including chairman Roy Bostock, also received strong protest votes of between 32 and 40 per cent. The three are members of Yahoo’s compensation committee and have borne the brunt of criticism over the company’s refusal to do more to link executive pay to performance.
A fifth director - Mr Gary Wilson, former chairman of Northwest Airlines - had 28 per cent of votes on his re-election withheld.
The remaining four directors each won more than 90 per cent of votes in favour of their re-election.
RBC’s Mr Sandler said the investor saga was likely to drag on for the next few quarters until the company concluded its previously announced partnership with Google, reached a deal with Microsoft, or sold one of its Asian properties to help the company remain independent.
REUTERS
Source : Straits Times - 07 Aug 2008
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