Upset by decreasing stock prices, investor groups are promisingto hold executives and company directors more accountable at annual meetingsthis year, which could turn the heat up at companies reeling from thecredit crunch, according to the Washington Post.
Activist investors are setting their eyes on a variety offinancial services companies including Citigroup and Merrill Lynch, amongothers. Moreover, shareholder proposals are demanding that major banks betterdisclose mortgage-related risks, that investment firms on Wall Street offermore transparency on their CEO succession plans, and that credit-ratingagencies address potential conflicts of interest that may surface from possiblytoo-close relationships with the companies that pay them, the Post reports.
Additionally, a network of shareholder groups, in theiranger over multimillion-dollar payouts to financial executives, hasstrengthened its efforts to rein in CEO compensation. “We have a singular focuson the residential homebuilding crisis, the credit crisis,” Jennifer O’Dell,assistant director of corporate affairs at the Laborers’ International Union ofNorth America, told the Post. “Shareholders are so angry, the public is soangry. The worlds have aligned. Thecrisis is so severe that we do have more leverage now.”