Buhlmann’s Corner

Movement in Corporate Governance

Scarcely has the German year begun when it gets stuck in the snow. At least in Corporate Governance there is some movement. Here a pleasant novelty comes along from Infineon. Wasn’t the board, headed by Peter Bauer, saying only two weeks ago that he found the kind of candidate chosen by the old Supervisory Board for the post of new Supervisory Board chairman better than the shareholders’ proposal? Now he’s got it: it is not he (the board) who decides the Supervisory Board, but we (the shareholders). The year’s off to a good start after all.
Then the old – new – candidate is sent on an introductory trip round shareholders – that’s pretty definitely progress too. The countermotion was logical and necessary. How does an old Supervisory Board have to be structured in order to think that by its own decisions it can perpetuate cooptation, when since its existence on the exchange it has never produced dividends, and last year was given only a 50.0 percent discharge? From the viewpoint of self-glorification, their only success is not to have actually gone bankrupt.
However the general meeting may have voted, one thing is evident: following Lufthansa (Bsirske), ThyssenKrupp (secondment right) and Infineon (Supervisory Board chair), the shareholders are winning. They are no longer just murmuring, but having a say. Those who do not listen, they need to feel that. The important thing is that a clear outcome, not some marginal bluff, should give back clarity to firms – but that clarity has to come from the shareholders.