I never said anything about what was most important, I said it was funny even they thought Jay was a bad idea.
As for their recommendation, they are making the argument that Peltz is a better choice compared to Maria Lagomasino for optics and to help make sure 2020 doesn't happen again. They are basically hedging.
In their own words:
“Dissident nominee Peltz, as a significant shareholder, could be additive to the succession process, providing assurance to other investors that the board is properly engaged this time around,” the report continued. “He could also help evaluate future capital allocation decisions. Moreover, multi-year concerns surrounding Lagomasino’s role as a compensation committee member strengthen the case that Peltz’s addition, on balance, would appear a net positive.”
I bolded the parts that jumped out at me.
That first one is the real winner here. That is about as weak an endorsement as I have ever heard.
He might be okay? Sweet, problems solved everyone. We've been told that it is conceivable a guy who wasn't around before could maybe, possibly, in some cases, prevent something from happening!
I'll admit this is a me thing and will gladly eat crow if I am wrong, but I tend to have a little more faith in people learning from first time mistakes (not second, sorry if you do it a second time you are on your own) and that is what the 2020 succession was, a first time mistake for those board members. With that experience, I don't believe they will let something that messy happen again and even that article points out that ISS agrees saying they think the board has already improved.
The second part I highlighted because it is exactly what a lot of us DON'T want from a Peltz addition. Disney needs to be investing in the parks right now, significantly. From a fans point of view, I don't want anyone near the decision-making process who is advocating to cut that back.
To be fair, in the most generous interpretation of both this and Peltz own words we could say maybe he won't want to advocate for cutting any spending, just spend it better but that would be ignoring his long, well established track record on the hope he will do it differently this time. Sounds like the worse bet to me so, until he provides details on where and how much he would invest I can only assume he wants to cut spending to increase shareholder value which makes him a worse choice than the existing members.
I'd love an actual good alternative here but so far none have presented themselves.
www.cnbc.com
