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		<title>‘There’s no war without cost’: Gildan’s proxy fight racked up US$77-million in expenses</title>
		<link>https://igopp.org/en/theres-no-war-without-cost-gildans-proxy-fight-racked-up-us77-million-in-expenses/</link>
		<comments>https://igopp.org/en/theres-no-war-without-cost-gildans-proxy-fight-racked-up-us77-million-in-expenses/#respond</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 01 Aug 2024 18:14:39 +0000</pubDate>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://igopp.org/theres-no-war-without-cost-gildans-proxy-fight-racked-up-us77-million-in-expenses/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The nasty proxy fight that plunged Gildan Activewear Inc. into turmoil for nearly half a year and ended with the return of chief executive Glenn Chamandy cost the company US$76.8-million, delivering a US$33-million windfall for lawyers and other advisers in exchange for their expertise. The CEO calls it an “abusive” waste of money. The Canadian [&#8230;]]]></description>
		<content><![CDATA[The nasty proxy fight that plunged Gildan Activewear Inc. into turmoil for nearly half a year and ended with the return of chief executive Glenn Chamandy cost the company US$76.8-million, delivering a US$33-million windfall for lawyers and other advisers in exchange for their expertise. The CEO calls it an “abusive” waste of money.

The Canadian maker of T-shirts and fleece on Thursday published a financial accounting of the battle that climaxed this past spring between Gildan’s former board of directors and rebel shareholders led by U.S. investment firm Browning West. It lays bare the millions that were spent on lawyers, strategic advisers and consultants of all kinds as well as severance for departed executives in what the company believes is one of the most costly proxy fights in history.

“It was an abusive amount of money being spent,” Mr. Chamandy said in an interview with The Globe and Mail following the company’s second-quarter earnings report, his first since he was reinstated as CEO in late May. “For a small company like Gildan, it just doesn’t make a lot of sense.”

At Gildan, a board’s defeat offers lessons in shareholder management

Mr. Chamandy said the cost is a direct result of a former board that used aggressive tactics, launching three lawsuits against Browning West and agreeing to generous payouts for executives who are now no longer with the company. The board could have avoided the entire saga by communicating its thoughts on his leadership to investors instead of surprising them with a dismissal they opposed, he said.

[...]

As part of the legal and advisory fees, the new board is reimbursing Browning West for the costs it racked up in waging its dissident campaign, which total US$9.4-million. Mr. Chamandy said the move is justified because it largely amounts to the firm defending itself against attacks by the former board, which he said sought to entrench itself and therefore spent more than twice what Browning West spent on such fees.

That’s one view. Another is that the original board believed it was acting in good faith and in the best interest of the corporation when they removed the CEO, said Catherine McCall, CEO of the Canadian Coalition for Good Governance. The board would then naturally move to bolster that position.

“I wouldn’t think that you should fold if you firmly believe in the rightness of what you’re doing just because somebody comes along and challenges that,” Ms. McCall said.

Ex-CEO Glenn Chamandy finds his record scrutinized as Gildan’s shareholders mull leadership change

To put Gildan’s US$76.8-million proxy contest bill in perspective, Walt Disney Co. won a high-profile proxy battle earlier this year with activist investor Nelson Peltz that could cost the two sides US$70-million by the time the dust settles, The Wall Street Journal reported in February. Disney is several times the size of Gildan as measured by revenue and market capitalization. A separate shareholder battle by Mr. Peltz at Proctor &#38; Gamble Co. in 2017 cost an estimated US$60-million, the priciest ever at the time, the newspaper said.

Gildan’s expenses for the fight and its related leadership changes ate up US$57.2-million during the company’s second quarter alone. That’s equal to almost all of Gildan’s US$58.4-million in net earnings for the period.

“It’s a bit mind-blowing, but there’s no war without cost,” said François Dauphin, CEO of the Montreal-based Institute for Governance of Private and Public Organizations, adding the sum should have been expected given the intensity and length of the proxy fight.

“It was a confrontation of two visions for the future of the company,” Mr. Dauphin said. “And the jury is still out. We will see in a few years whether that cost was prohibitive or whether it was a good investment.”

Browning West has said a combination of operational improvements at Gildan, share buybacks and an improved executive compensation scheme could nearly double the company’s stock price to US$60 by the end of next year and propel it to US$100 within five years.

Read more [1]

[1] https://igopp.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/THERES1.pdf]]></content>
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		<title>At Gildan, a board’s defeat offers lessons in shareholder management</title>
		<link>https://igopp.org/en/at-gildan-a-boards-defeat-offers-lessons-in-shareholder-management/</link>
		<comments>https://igopp.org/en/at-gildan-a-boards-defeat-offers-lessons-in-shareholder-management/#respond</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 24 May 2024 20:53:17 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[IGOPP Site web]]></dc:creator>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://igopp.org/at-gildan-a-boards-defeat-offers-lessons-in-shareholder-management/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Glenn Chamandy, co-founder of Gildan Activewear Inc. GIL-T, left his job as chief executive officer last year in a cloud of mystery after relations with his board soured. Now he returns triumphant – and under more pressure than ever before to deliver returns for the investors who won his job back. The raucous five-month battle that engulfed [&#8230;]]]></description>
		<content><![CDATA[Glenn Chamandy, co-founder of Gildan Activewear Inc. GIL-T, left his job as chief executive officer last year in a cloud of mystery after relations with his board soured. Now he returns triumphant – and under more pressure than ever before to deliver returns for the investors who won his job back.

The raucous five-month battle that engulfed the T-shirt maker came to a sudden conclusion late Thursday, when Gildan’s entire board of directors and CEO Vince Tyra quit [1], admitting defeat at the hands of activist investor Browning West. The Los Angeles-based firm, which owns about 5 per cent of Gildan’s shares, has now taken control of the company and will reinstate Mr. Chamandy as CEO, with United Rentals Inc. CEO Michael Kneeland becoming chairman.

Mr. Tyra’s bio has already been scrubbed from the Gildan [2] website.

The feud was a rare case of activists pushing for the status quo. And though it’s often hazardous to predict whether the fallout from such cases will have a lasting impact on the Canadian corporate landscape, observers say it does provide a cautionary tale for other boards overseeing strong-willed executives who directors think might be past their best-before date.

Gildan’s legacy board, the directors who dismissed [3] Mr. Chamandy last December, weren’t fast or blunt enough in explaining publicly why they showed him the door, according to one insider who spoke openly on condition they not be named.

Other experts say those directors underestimated the strength of Mr. Chamandy’s backing from Browning West and other institutional investors – and their resolve.

“It does show that sometimes the personality, the charisma, and the history of a long-time CEO and founder with investors is not something you can break easily,” said François Dauphin, president of the Institute of Governance for Public and Private Organizations. “Once you start pushing against that, it’s really hard to get yourself out.”

Former Gildan chairman Don Berg and the other directors who dismissed Mr. Chamandy initially said that they didn’t see eye to eye with the CEO on the timing of a leadership handover and they worked until the very last moment to try to hammer out a compromise with him. It wasn’t until after Mr. Chamandy was gone that they took a harsher tone, saying he’d become increasingly detached from his job and unable to articulate a credible long-term growth strategy for the company.

Even if the board’s process to address CEO succession was appropriate – engaging advisers and considering Mr. Chamandy’s proposals, for example – the announcement of his termination still took investors by surprise. And if there’s one warning for other companies from this saga, it’s to communicate with shareholders more closely when working through leadership issues, said Catherine McCall, executive director of the Canadian Coalition for Good Governance.

“I don’t think the lesson is that shareholders should micromanage the board because I think the situation, the circumstances, don’t encourage that takeaway,” Ms. McCall said. “[But] they should have maybe been talking to shareholders more. ... If anything, this is going to prompt or encourage more shareholder engagement.”

Read more [4]

[1] https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-gildan-board-resigns-clearing-the-way-for-glenn-chamandy-to-retake/
[2] https://www.theglobeandmail.com/topics/gildan-activewear-inc/
[3] https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-gildan-activewear-replaces-ceo-in-sudden-shakeup/
[4] https://igopp.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/At-Gildan-a-board’s-defeat-offers-lessons-in-shareholder-management_Globe-and-Mail_May-2024.pdf]]></content>
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		<title>Browning West seeks court order to prevent Gildan sale before vote on new directors</title>
		<link>https://igopp.org/en/browning-west-seeks-court-order-to-prevent-gildan-sale-before-vote-on-new-directors/</link>
		<comments>https://igopp.org/en/browning-west-seeks-court-order-to-prevent-gildan-sale-before-vote-on-new-directors/#respond</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 08 Apr 2024 03:25:58 +0000</pubDate>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://igopp.org/browning-west-seeks-court-order-to-prevent-gildan-sale-before-vote-on-new-directors/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[U.S. investment firm Browning West is seeking a court order preventing the board of Gildan Activewear Inc. from signing any binding deal to sell the clothing maker until shareholders vote on new directors. The request was made last week as an amendment to an existing suit in the Quebec Superior Court’s commercial division, filed by [&#8230;]]]></description>
		<content><![CDATA[U.S. investment firm Browning West is seeking a court order preventing the board of Gildan Activewear Inc. from signing any binding deal to sell the clothing maker until shareholders vote on new directors.
The request was made last week as an amendment to an existing suit in the Quebec Superior Court’s commercial division, filed by Browning West, which has a roughly 5-per-cent stake in Gildan [1].
“We do not believe the current board has a mandate to be making any decisions about the future of the company,” Browning West founders Usman Nabi and Peter Lee said in an e-mailed statement.
Gildan dismissed Browning’s gambit to hamstring existing directors as “ridiculous.”
It’s the latest in a series of legal volleys between Montreal-based Gildan and Browning West in what has become one of the most acrimonious corporate power struggles in recent years in Canada. As the clock ticks down on an April 10 deadline [2] for initial offers for the apparel manufacturer, the clash has taken on another level of urgency.
The saga, now in its fourth month, started when the board fired co-founder and long-time chief executive Glenn Chamandy last December. The board concluded he had run out of ideas to increase sales and profits, and hired former Fruit of the Loom executive Vince Tyra to replace him. Dissident shareholders unhappy about that decision are trying to push current directors out and demanding the reinstatement of Mr. Chamandy back at the helm.
[...]
Gildan punched back Sunday.
“This latest tactic is ridiculous and without precedent or merit,” Gildan spokesman Simon Beauchemin said by e-mail. “It appears designed solely as an attempt to generate headlines and obstruct a potential sale of the company.”
At least one court decision has confirmed boards can do what they believe is in the best interest of the company for the entirety of their term. In a 2011 case concerning Bennett Environmental, then in the midst of a proxy battle, Justice Ruth Mesbur, an Ontario Superior Court judge, said: “A board need not curtail its activities in the face of a fight for control.”
In an interview with The Globe and Mail on March 27, Gildan chairman Donald Berg said the board chose to launch a sales process because the takeover approach it received was a “serious offer.” Shareholders will ultimately have the last say in any case, he said.
It’s not in the best interest of shareholders and other stakeholders to seek to tie the hands of the board of directors and prevent its work, said François Dauphin, chief executive of Montreal’s Institute for Governance of Private and Public Organizations, who’s been following the Gildan drama. Regardless of the recriminations some shareholders might have against the current board, directors must consider and analyze any offer received, which might mean having to incur costs, he said.
Said Mr. Dauphin: “Browning West put forth its plan and vision for Gildan. Vince Tyra’s plan is expected soon. Shareholders will have the choice between those two visions and a proposed purchase offer, if there is one. It would be reasonable to let shareholders decide on these choices. Everything else is just noise.”
Read more [3]

[1] https://www.theglobeandmail.com/topics/gildan-activewear-inc/
[2] https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-gildan-sets-april-10-deadline-for-initial-takeover-offers/
[3] https://igopp.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Browning-West-seeks-court-order-to-prevent-Gildan-sale-before-vote-on-new-directors-The-Globe-and-Mail_April-2024.pdf]]></content>
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		<title>Audet family was right to reject Rogers&#8217; attempted takeover of Cogeco</title>
		<link>https://igopp.org/en/audet-family-was-right-to-reject-rogers-attempted-takeover-of-cogeco/</link>
		<comments>https://igopp.org/en/audet-family-was-right-to-reject-rogers-attempted-takeover-of-cogeco/#respond</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 11 Sep 2020 14:35:55 +0000</pubDate>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://igopp.org/audet-family-was-right-to-reject-rogers-attempted-takeover-of-cogeco/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[In a surprising move, Rogers and Altice USA made an offer to buy Cogeco and Cogeco Communications and split their assets between them. If Cogeco were a typical Canadian corporation with a one-share, one-vote capital structure, the would-be buyers could disregard any reticence or opposition by the board of directors and transmit their offer directly [&#8230;]]]></description>
		<content><![CDATA[In a surprising move, Rogers and Altice USA made an offer to buy Cogeco and Cogeco Communications and split their assets between them. If Cogeco were a typical Canadian corporation with a one-share, one-vote capital structure, the would-be buyers could disregard any reticence or opposition by the board of directors and transmit their offer directly to shareholders. Given that Rogers already holds a stake of 41 per cent in the subordinate shares of Cogeco and 33 per cent for Cogeco Communications, the outcome is fairly predictable. If shareholders representing two-thirds or more of the shares vote for their offer, the deal is done (leaving aside any possible wobbling by the CRTC or the Competition Bureau).

But because of multiple voting shares, the Audet family, which has effective control of these entities, can and did bluntly reject the attempted takeover. And for good reason. Under the family’s leadership, Cogeco shareholders enjoyed a compound return of 9.8 per cent over the last five years and 11.8 per cent over the last ten. Shareholders of Cogeco Communications were rewarded with a compound return of 10.8 per cent over five years and 13.2 per cent over ten years.

Rogers/Altice offered a “generous” premium of some 30 per cent over the average share price of August 2020. But, compared to the share price of Cogeco entities at the beginning of 2020, the bid price represented a measly 2.3 per cent premium for Cogeco and just 18.6 per cent for Cogeco Communications.

On their face, those facts would justify a rejection of the Rogers/Altice offer and perhaps lead to further negotiations. That would prove a point often made in favor of multiple-voting shares: the controlling shareholders are in a great position to extract the best price from would-be buyers for the benefit of all shareholders.

That is not the denouement here, however, as the Audet family has made it clear their rejection of the “hostile” bid is not tactical but is firm and unconditional. Rogers should not be surprised by such a decision nor continue to pursue this acquisition: its own shareholder structure gives total control to the Rogers family (and now to a “control trust,”).

In an era of exotic funds and of “activist” hedge funds seeking to bully companies into taking actions of only short-term benefit, a dual class of shares becomes very attractive and beneficial for the whole industrial system of a country. It is the ultimate defense mechanism, particularly in Canada, where staggered boards do not exist and poison pills are of very short duration. Even in the U.S., however, from 2017 to 2019 some 16.5 per cent of companies going public did so with a dual class of shares, a share structure that is especially popular among tech companies.

Some will argue, as they always do, that all shareholders should have a voice in a takeover decision, as they would with a one-share, one-vote model, and that multiple voting shares represent a breach of shareholder “democracy.” That’s balderdash. The equivalent of “one person-one vote” democracy in the domain of shareholding would be “one shareholder-one vote,” irrespective of the number of shares held. In political democracies, citizens do not acquire more voting rights because they pay more taxes to the government.

Short-term “tourist” shareholders should no more get to vote than tourists who happen to be in a country on voting day should be able to claim voting rights. Like immigrants, newcomers to the shareholding of a company should have to wait a significant time before acquiring “citizenship” and the right to vote. Clearly, one share-one vote can’t be taken seriously.

We live in an age when all institutional investors call on corporations to pursue ESG (Environment, Social, Governance) objectives and in a country where the legal framework as interpreted by the Supreme Court calls on boards of directors to take into account the interests of all stakeholders, without giving preference to any particular group, not even shareholders. Many dual-class companies become family businesses, which have a longer life, are better integrated in their communities and are more likely to plan and manage with a long-term perspective and careful consideration of all stakeholders. The controlling shareholders of the Cogeco companies are exemplars of these benefits associated with family control. May these family-controlled companies, including Rogers, remain impervious to unwanted takeovers and other financial shenanigans.
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