Campus

Lehner turns a critical eye to the way shareholders’ meetings are presently run

Ulrich Lehner would like to see a reform in the organization of shareholders’ meetings. In a conference with the economic press (Wirtschaftspublizistische Vereinigung WPV) in Düsseldorf, 68-year-old Lehner explained that shareholders’ meetings have for some time ceased to represent the share-bearing component part of the issuers.

Errors still few

The number of errors in company year-end accounts registered in 2014 remains consistently low. The percentage hovers at 13% just under the 14% of the previous year. In 2014 the German accounts auditing authority (Deutsche Prüfungsstelle für Rechnungslegung - DPR) conducted 104 audits, compared to the 110 of the year before. Of 99 spot checks, 3 motivated audits and 2 audits requested by the body overseeing financial services (Bundesanstalt für Finandienstleistungsaufsicht - BaFin) the adjusted number of errors – discounting repeated errors or presentations featuring data which are manifestly erroneous – is 12 (11) percent. A revision of the numbers in 2013 indicated that errors discovered were corrected in the next presentation and that the pointers issued by the DPR were adopted in the accounts of 2014. The major issue this year is the state of the group. The auditors are being painstaking in their examination of performance indicators, both financial and non-financial.