Garnet Roach
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‘You sit down with tax collectors and prostitutes’: How Bowyer Research is reshaping proxy voting on the right
Sister title IR Impact talks to the family shop wielding outsized influence with its ESG-skeptic voting policies Bowyer Research first came to the attention of IR Impact – and many on the mainstream governance scene – when the firm’s ESG-skeptic voting policies were picked up by ISS. Today, those policies are available through all the major proxy voting advisory firms and Bowyer Research, which is essentially a mom-and-pop (plus kids) shop run out of Pennsylvania, advises many millions of dollars, including the $57 bn Texas Permanent School Fund. Jerry Bowyer, who co-founded the firm with wife Susan, feels the right…
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Proxy season 2026: What to expect from rule 14a-8 changes
Governance experts share their predictions for the upcoming proxy season following the SEC’s pullback around shareholder proposals Among the tumult of 2025 wasa November announcement from the SECstating that it would reduce oversight of shareholder proposal disputes. Blaming ‘current resource and timing considerations following the lengthy government shutdown,’ the regulator said that it would end ‘substantial’ reviews of no-action requests under rule 14a-8, with the change applying to the proxy season running from October 2025 to September 2026 – as well as anything it hadn’t got to before the decision was made. You canread more about the SEC’s decision here.…
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As Trump signs executive order targeting ISS and Glass Lewis, experts say change is already happening
Order comes after weeks of rumor that the US administration would formalize scrutiny of proxy vote advisory firms ‘Unbeknownst to many Americans, twoforeign-owned proxy advisors, ISS and Glass Lewis, play a significant role in shaping the policies and priorities of America’s largest companies through the shareholder voting process,’ wroteUS President Donald Trump on Thursday as – after weeks of rumor – he signed an executive ordertargeting the two firms. In it, Trump advises everyone from the SEC to the Federal Trade Commission, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Labor to put a regulatory spotlight on the big two. The rhetoric…
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Tesla: How do you get support for a $1 trn pay package? Give shareholders a slice of the pie
Jerry Bowyer talks about why his ESG-skeptic guidelines advise a yes vote at today’s ‘triggering’ Tesla AGM ISS is recommending against Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s $1 tn compensation package. Glass Lewis too. CalPERS and NBIM, manager of the world’s most valuable sovereign wealth fund, have each come out publicly against. But with the Tesla AGM happening today online and at Tesla’s Gigafactory Texas, one small, family-run proxy advisory firm – whose ESG-skeptic voting guidelines are offered by ISS, and which boasted the $57 bn Texas Permanent School Fund as the first state fund to sign up – is backing Musk’s…
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The sustainability Taliban, the eco right and why we need a new language for ESG: down the rabbit hole with Robert Eccles
How a liberal ex-hippy found common ground with conservatives in the increasingly polarized world of ESG When Robert Eccles wrote a piece calledGrift capitalism: The GOP’s brilliant strategy for ripping off ordinary Americans, it led to a challenge from a conservative friend of 20 years: if you can find a conservative that thinks sustainability is good for capital markets, will you stop ‘writing nasty stuff’ about Republicans? That led him to the position he speaks from today: a liberal ex-hippy who has found common ground with the so-called ‘eco right’. Eccles, a well-known author and lecturer who has been writing…
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Cross-party politics: new role for former Trump official at Microsoft as firm also hires Biden-era lawyer
CJ Mahoney and Lisa Monaco named to new roles at computer giant When’s the best time to start thinking about next year’s proxy season? If you ask the best-prepared corporate secretaries, that planning process starts as early as the end of the previous year’s, particularly if you have to rethink your process in any form. As the fulcrum of any company’s communication with shareholders and wider stakeholders, the proxy statement has evolved to become more than just a regulatory fulfilment: many of 2025’s proxy statements conveyed much more about a given organization’s purpose, message and strategy. And, as 2025’s proxy…
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Talking DEI under Trump 2.0: how anti-woke investors are hijacking pro-ESG proposals
Award-winning IR professionals from Sofi and Ford share their experiences on the DEI tightrope, with clear lessons for the Governance Intelligence community US software maker Adobe has named Louise Pentland as its new chief legal officer, replacing interim legal head Gloria Chen and former general counsel Dana Rao, who departed the company last year. Pentland joins the San Jose, California-based company from streaming service Roku, where she served as general counsel after joining in July 2024. Prior to that, she worked as chief counsel for the Walt Disney Company’s Experiences division, which oversees the media giant’s theme parks, cruise operations…
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Aptly named Mark Hacker joins AI and cloud tech firm Lumen
New executive vice president and CLO joins from Motorola Solutions Luisiana-headquartered Lumen, an AI and cloud technology company involved in everything from metro connectivity to cloud services, has named Mark Hacker as its new executive vice president and chief legal officer, effective immediately. Hacker joins Lumen from Motorola Solutions where he served as general counsel and chief administrative officer a role that saw him lead ‘high-stakes litigation to protect the company’s intellectual property, build a trusted government affairs presence in Washington, DC, and help drive shareholder value during a period of significant change and growth’, according to a statement from…
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ESG: Over or in it for the long haul? IR Impact Forum takes debate to Canada
Debate at the IR Impact Forum – Canada 2025 put a spotlight on the views that make up each side of an increasingly politicized area of IR Whether ESG is over or increasingly relevant, in need of reform or greater standardization is the great debate. Has the term become too ‘woke’? Is it too much of a political hot potato? Does good ESG equate to better share price performance, or has it been hijacked under the pretense of improving returns? These were the topics up for debate at a recent event hosted by Governance Intelligence’s sister title, IR Impact, when…
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Why Brian Thompson’s killing has prompted companies to think about executive safety and corporate purpose
The shooting of the UnitedHealthcare CEO should prompt questions about your C-suite’s security and is an issue for board consideration ‘Executive security used to be something of a hard sell,’ says Iylia Lavatelli, a former close-protection security provider now working at operational resilience firm Restrata, talking about budget as well as executive willingness playing their parts in what any security manager can achieve. That, of course, changed with the shooting of Brian Thompson, UnitedHealthcare CEO, in New York. The news now is of companies scrambling to organize their security and senior profiles being removed from corporate websites – health insurance…