Danmark har højere “Busy Board” end Norge og vestligt gennemsnit: I forskningspapir med titlen ”Better Directors or Distracted Directors? An International Analysis of Busy Boards” konkluderer forskere, at “This study examines the effect of busy directors and boards on the value of a set of international firms from 1999-2012. We find that busy directors and boards are a global phenomenon. We discover that national culture helps to explain the cross-sectional variation in director and board busyness. We determine that firms with busy boards exhibit lower market-to-book ratios and reduced profitability. This effect, however, is reversed for younger firms. We conclude that the advising ability of these networked directors is useful for younger firms. A demographic analysis shows that multiple directorships are positively associated with firm performance and education, but negatively associated with female directors.” Undersøgelsen viser, at Danmark har flere travle bestyrelsesmedlemmer end Norge, men færre end Sverige og Finland. Danmark ligger dog over et vestligt gennemsnit.
Svensk governance komité gør udfald mod EU Kommisionen: Under overskriften “The threat from the European Commission” skriver det svenske Corporate Governance Board i sin årsberetning (side 4), at “the EU’s activities within the field of corporate governance are troubling. The Commission has now been granted the right to issue ”guidelines” for the application of various measures within EU legislation. These guidelines are issued without any of the influence from the member states which normally takes place as part of the legislative process (…) The Commission admittedly always points out that these guidelines are not mandatory, but merely ”advisory” to the companies to which they are addressed. In reality, however, there is a danger that they create a generally applicable norm that in practice governs how companies are expected to apply the underlying regulation. The risk therefore is that such guidelines will be used to actually implement more far-reaching and detailed regulation than it was able to achieve in the legislation itself.”
Stigende andel nej-stemmer til genvalg af revisor på sydafrikanske selskabers generalforsamlinger: ”Bernard Agulhas, chief executive of the IRBA said: “Of the 102 auditor appointment resolutions tabled at annual general meetings since November 2016, 51 recorded an increase inopposition; of these 24 resulted in significant shareholder opposition to the auditor’s reappointment. The most significant opposition recorded an increase of up to 40% year on year in the votes against the reappointment of auditors. “The most recent annual general meetings to be subject to this increased shareholder opposition were Telkom and PPC Ltd, which reflected 23% and 14% increases in the no vote. While such an increase may seem insignificant in some instances, it indicates to us that even minority shareholders are finding their voice.” The IBRA’s figures show that the largest increases in opposition to auditor appointments occurred at the AGM of Lonmin in January (40.3% rise), Reunert and the Spar Group – both meetings were held in February and had increases in their dissent of 37% and 35.6% respectively.”
Bestyrelser bør lægge mere vægt på etiske aspekter i årsrapporten: “Company boards, particularly the non-executive director members, need to ensure they take an ethical and value-led approach to financial reporting according to the latest paper from the UK’s Institute of Business Ethics. The author of the report Guy Jubb, former governance head at Standard Life Investments, stated that accounting is not simply a question of following rigid rules but is also about making judgements and these will always have an ethical dimension. Responsible financial reporting Jubb argued is at the heart of responsible capitalism and directors should make the right choices about how to present profits and other key financial data. Boards should, therefore, be able to deal with challenges such as the short term pressures of the market or the desire by executives to meet remuneration targets,” skriver manifest.
