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Big Yahoo Stockholder Demands a Recount
Capital Research & Management Is Demanding A Recount According to the Wall Street Journal Blog "All things Digital"
Aug. 5, 2008 12:30 PM
The surprise three-to-one margin that overwhelmingly returned Yahoo’s board to office last Friday at the shareholders meeting proved too big for Capital Research & Management to swallow. It’s demanding a recount, according to the Wall Street Journal blog All Things Digital, which has been all over the Yahoo story for months.
According to the official tally, CEO Jerry Yang got 85.4% of the vote (14.6% withheld), and chairman Roy Bostock got 79.5% (20.5% withheld), both faring better than last year.
Capital Research, which owns 16.3% of Yahoo and has a bone to pick with both of them as well as some of the other directors, reportedly wants to know if its nay votes were “not counted, counted incorrectly or even voted incorrectly,” the blog says.
It has reportedly asked Broadridge Financial Solutions, the third-party firm that counted the votes, to count them again.
The AP and Reuters said the request was made by Capital Research Global Investors, the Capital Research fund that owns 6.5% of Yahoo and whose manager Gordon Crawford has been outspoken in his criticism of the way the men handled Microsoft, made the request.
Capital World Investors, the Capital Research fund that controls 9.8%, has been more reserved with its opinions but before the stockholders meeting was reportedly leaning towards voting at least some of its shares against the board.
The AllThingsD blog also notes that there was an “amazing drop in the number of shares that were not voted at all.” Seems only 75.8% of shares were voted, way less than last year or the year before that.
In a statement, Yahoo allowed for a possible mistake. It “was not,” it said, “a party to any errors which may have been made either by a voting institution or a proxy processing intermediary acting on behalf of banks, brokers and institutions.”
About Maureen O'GaraMaureen O'Gara is the Virtualization News Desk editor of SYS-CON Media. She is the publisher of famous "Billygrams" and the editor-in-chief of "Client/Server News" for more than a decade. One of the most respected technology reporters in the business, Maureen can be reached by email at maureen(at)sys-con.com or paperboy(at)g2news.com, and by phone at 516 759-7025.