Category: Corporate law
Strine highlights the importance of the “not-sexy” process of board minutes
In an article in the Fordham Journal of Corporate and Financial Law, “Minutes Are Worth the Minutes: Good Documentation Practices Improve Board Deliberations and Reduce Regulatory and Litigation Risk,” former Chief Justice of the Delaware Supreme Court, Leo Strine, discusses—convincingly—the importance of good “corporate minuting and documentation processes.” (See also this post presented on The Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance.) Strine acknowledges upfront that the topic is “decidedly not sexy,” and “the favorite task of no one involved in the process.” Drafting minutes, he suggests, is the “equivalent of eating your least favorite vegetable, either you do it hastily, as infrequently as you can, or, if you can get away with it, not at all.” (Perhaps the leitmotif of this piece might be Strine’s evident hostility to vegetables. Later, he characterizes minutes as “the spinach that must be eaten.”) But, in his view, it is an “unquestionably essential, corporate governance task.” He contends that good quality minutes can reduce litigation risk. And he brings us the receipts, highlighting numerous Delaware cases “where the quality of these practices has determined the outcome of motions and cases,” underscoring the “importance of quality and timely documentation of board decision-making, the material benefits of doing things right, and the considerable downside of sloppy, tardy practices.” But that’s not all. He also invests the documentation process with a larger purpose: he contends that an effective process of crafting and reviewing minutes by the board, together with its counsel and advisors, can serve as an integral part of the board’s deliberative process in arriving at a sound decision based on its considered business judgment. With both of these benefits in mind, the article identifies several effective and efficient practices. Strine offers a lot of wise counsel that readers may want to heed.
Delaware Supreme Court applies MFW framework to other conflicted transactions
In In re Match Group, Inc. Derivative Litigation, the Delaware Supreme Court answered some important questions about the standard of review applicable to conflicted transactions under Delaware law. The first question relates to the application of the model used in Kahn v. M & F Worldwide Corp., commonly referred to as the “MFW framework.” In that 2014 case, the Delaware Supreme Court held that, instead of the more stringent “entire fairness” standard of review that would ordinarily apply in the context of mergers between a controlling stockholder and its corporate subsidiary, the business judgment standard of review should govern “where the merger is conditioned ab initio upon both the approval of an independent, adequately-empowered Special Committee that fulfills its duty of care; and the uncoerced, informed vote of a majority of the minority stockholders.” The question remained, however, whether, in the context of conflicted controlling stockholder transactions that do not involve freeze-out mergers, MFW may be applied to invoke the business judgment rule. And in a related question, can the business judgment rule be applied if the “defendant shows either approval by an independent special committee or approval by an uncoerced, fully informed, unaffiliated stockholder vote,” but not both? In addition, the Court addressed the question of whether all members of an “independent special committee” must be “independent” to satisfy the requirements of MFW.
Morris Nichols discusses proposed new amendments to the DGCL
You might be interested in this recent Alert from the Delaware firm, Morris Nichols Arsht & Tunnell (including a more expansive article), which addresses amendments to the Delaware General Corporation Law just proposed by the Council of the Corporation Law Section of the Delaware State Bar Association. It’s worth emphasizing that the proposed amendments have not yet been submitted to the Delaware General Assembly for its consideration and approval, so they are not yet effective. As the Alert indicates, the proposed new amendments are designed to address the effects of recent Delaware cases highlighting “that the legal requirements identified in the cases were not necessarily in line with market practice. The Amendments are designed to bring existing law in line with such practice.”
Can director commitments policies help prevent overextended boards?
There is a lot going on at companies, and—you may be surprised to hear—not all of it is new regulation. There are new technologies, such as AI, global political instability and social change, not to mention ESG and cybersecurity. Many of these topics, as they affect a company, fall within the remit of the board for oversight. The energy and time necessary can be overwhelming. In this article, Director Commitments Policies, Overboarding, and Board Refreshment, proxy advisory firm Glass Lewis discusses one way to help ensure that directors have “sufficient time and energy to fulfill their duties and obligations to shareholders”: a director commitments policy. As a corollary, GL maintains, these policies can also serve to boost board refreshment, and can represent a vital measure of corporate governance.
Can companies escape the trap of politics?
We hear a lot about companies taking public positions on political issues—as well as the backlash that many experience as a result. Whether you think corporate participation in politics is a good thing or a bad thing, you might be interested in this thought-provoking paper from the University of Pennsylvania Institute for Law & Economics, How Did Corporations Get Stuck in Politics and Can They Escape?,© by Professors Jill Fisch and Jeff Schwartz (All rights reserved, 2024). In their paper, the authors observe that, while, historically, companies have long engaged in politics and lobbying, something seems quite different today. How? The difference is that companies seem to be taking public positions on any number of hot political issues, even if those issues are not connected to the conduct of their businesses. That is, while companies may take these positions “for business reasons—to appeal to their customers, employees, or investors”—these issues are not necessarily intrinsic to their business operations. The authors contend that this type of corporate behavior, which they call “corporate political posturing,” is “problematic,” creating potential risks for the company, its shareholders and for society. The authors suggest some ways for companies to depoliticize, including through coordinated “voluntary disarmament.” Certainly, some ideas to think about.
Some highlights of the 2023 PLI Securities Regulation Institute
This year’s PLI Securities Regulation Institute was a source for a lot of useful information and interesting perspectives. Panelists discussed a variety of topics, including climate disclosure (although no one shared any insights into the timing of the SEC’s final rules), proxy season issues, accounting issues, ESG and anti-ESG, and some of the most recent SEC rulemakings, such as pay versus performance, cybersecurity, buybacks and 10b5-1 plans. Some of the panels focused on these recent rulemakings echoed concerns expressed last year about the difficulty and complexity of implementation of these new rules, only this time, we also heard a few panelists questioning the rationale and effectiveness of these new mandates. What was the purpose of all this complication? Was it addressing real problems or just theoretical ones? Are investors really taking the disclosure into account? Is it all for naught? Pay versus performance, for example, was described as “a lot of work,” but, according to one of the program co-chairs, in terms of its impact, a “nothingburger.” (Was “nothingburger” the word of the week?) Aside from the agita over the need to implement the volume of complex rules, a key theme seemed to be the importance of controls and process—the need to have them, follow them and document that you followed them—as well as an intensified focus on cross-functional teams and avoiding silos. In addition, geopolitical uncertainty seems to be affecting just about everything. (For Commissioner Mark Uyeda’s perspective on the rulemaking process presented in his remarks before the Institute, see this PubCo post.) Below are just some of the takeaways, in no particular order.
NYSE proposes listing standards for a “natural asset company”—what’s that?
The NYSE has proposed to adopt new listing standards for the common equity securities of a “Natural Asset Company,” a new type of public company defined by the NYSE as “a corporation whose primary purpose is to actively manage, maintain, restore (as applicable), and grow the value of natural assets and their production of ecosystem services.” And, “where doing so is consistent with the company’s primary purpose,” a NAC would also be required to “seek to conduct sustainable revenue-generating operations,” and “may also engage in other activities that support community well-being, provided such activities are sustainable.” In addition, NACs would be prohibited from engaging in unsustainable activities, that is, activities that “cause any material adverse impact on the condition of the natural assets under its control, and that extract resources without replenishing them.” Although existing regulatory and listing requirements would continue to apply to NACs, in many ways, the proposal contemplates something approaching a new NAC governance and reporting ecosystem, if you will, that would involve specific provisions in corporate charters, new mandatory policies (environmental and social, biodiversity, human rights, equitable benefit sharing), new prescribed responsibilities for audit committees and a new reporting framework, including mandatory “Ecological Performance Reports.” Why did the NYSE introduce this proposal? Notwithstanding all of the developments in ESG disclosure and investing (such as ESG funds), the NYSE contends that “investors still express an unmet need for efficient, pure-play exposure to nature and climate.” According to the Intrinsic Exchange Group, which pioneered the NAC concept and advises public sector and private landowners on the creation of NACs, “[b]y taking a NAC public through an IPO, the market transaction will succeed in converting the long-understood—but to-date unpriced—value of nature into financial capital. This monetization event will generate the funding needed to manage, restore, and grow healthy ecosystems around the world and bring us closer to achieving a truly sustainable, circular economy.” Will this proposal be a game changer to rescue our environment or merely a chimera? Time will tell. The proposal is open for comment for 21 days following publication in the Federal Register.
Starbucks decision to adopt DEI initiative within Board’s business judgment
In August last year, the National Center for Public Policy Research filed a complaint against Starbucks and its officers and directors, National Center for Public Policy Research v. Schultz, alleging that they caused Starbucks to adopt a group of policies that discriminate based on race in violation of a “wide array of state and federal civil rights laws.” Starbucks characterized the policies as designed to “realize its ‘commitment to Inclusion, Diversity, and Equity[.]’” Starbucks, its officers and directors moved to dismiss, and a hearing on the motion was held on August 11, 2023. At the hearing, the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Washington granted the motion to dismiss with prejudice and closed the case. A month on, the Court’s Order has now been released. While the Order discusses the various legal bases for the dismissal, the Court’s sentiment was perhaps best summed up by its statement in the Order that “[t]his Complaint has no business being before this Court and resembles nothing more than a political platform.” Much like the recent decision of the Delaware Chancery Court in Simeone v. The Walt Disney Company, the Court concluded that “[c]ourts of law have no business involving themselves with reasonable and legal decisions made by the board of directors of public corporations.” Are we starting to see a trend with regard to board business decisions about corporate social policy?
Disney decision to speak out on issue of social significance within board’s business judgment
Boards and their advisors seeking to navigate the culture wars and their often conflicting pressures from a variety of stakeholders and outside groups may find some comfort and guidance in this recent decision from the Delaware Chancery Court in Simeone v. The Walt Disney Company. The case involved a books-and-records demand from a stockholder asserting a potential breach of fiduciary duty by Disney’s directors and officers in their determination to publicly oppose Florida’s so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill. Originally, Disney was silent on the bill. However, following reproaches from employees and other creative partners, Disney’s board deliberated at a special meeting, and the company changed course and publicly criticized the bill. The Court declined to grant the plaintiff’s books-and-records request, concluding that the plaintiff had not provided a credible basis from which to infer wrongdoing and thus had not “demonstrated a proper purpose to inspect books and records.” Rather, the Court concluded, the Disney board had made a business decision to reverse course—“a decision that cannot provide a credible basis to suspect potential mismanagement irrespective of its outcome.” Under Delaware’s business judgment rule, directors have “significant discretion to guide corporate strategy—including on social and political issues.” Importantly, the Court confirmed that, in exercising its business judgment, a board may take into account the interests of non-stockholder corporate stakeholders where those interests are “rationally related” to building long-term value.
Commissioner Uyeda addresses shareholder proposal overload—is “private ordering” the answer?
On Wednesday, SEC Commissioner Mark Uyeda spoke to the Society for Corporate Governance 2023 National Conference on the topic of shareholder proposals under rule 14a-8, a topic on which, historically, the commissioners’ energetic back-and-forth has been reflected in Corp Fin interpretations that have literally shifted back and forth. You might think these reversals are a new thing, but Uyeda reminds us about the goings-on in 2015, when Whole Foods was first permitted to exclude, as a conflicting proposal under Rule 14a-8(i)(9), a proxy access proposal, only to have the staff reverse course shortly thereafter. (See this PubCo post, this PubCo post and this PubCo post.) “Relying on the Commission’s rules, or its staff’s positions,” he later observes, “in this area is akin to building a sand castle on the beach. Any rule or interpretation, no matter how recently adopted, is at risk of being erased by the next wave.” However, Uyeda finds the reversals over the course of the last few years particularly problematic. In his view, the recent interpretative changes in SLB 14L have led to a surfeit of proposals the aggregate effect of which he finds to be “value-eroding.” He suggests some approaches to address the problem. Are we looking at a fundamental—some might say radical— reimagining of the shareholder proposal process?
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