DealLawyers.com Blog

December 2, 2014

More on “Survey: 33% of Boards Met With Activist Shareholder In Past Year”

Recently, I blogged about this PwC survey that found that nearly one-in-three directors say their board has interacted with an activist shareholder. Here’s a response from Michael Levin of “The Activist Investor”:

This PwC survey is rather flawed. As a measure of sentiment among big company directors it’s okay, although I don’t quite care what big company directors think about most subjects. The meeting figure that leads your blog post probably overstates the percentage. My read of the survey methodology indicates that 29% of the surveyed directors met with an activist investor in the past year. I suspect strongly that they surveyed multiple directors on the same board, though. If they adjust the sample for individual boards, rather than among directors, they’ll find that the percentage is much lower.

From another angle, though, I’d love to see the figure at – or close – to 100%. Directors should meet with all investors, frequently and substantively, including the activist ones.