Financial Times | ExxonMobil has taken a hammer to climate activists’ shareholder proposals, marking a significant escalation in the battle between shareholders who file resolutions at annual meetings and executive managers.
[…]ExxonMobil’s highly unusual lawsuit challenging a shareholder proposal has triggered global alarm about investor rights. Exxon is arguing that two climate activists who filed a shareholder resolution at the oil major are not interested in shareholder returns, but are instead using corporate governance to campaign against global warming.
Institutional investors don’t see it that way, and fear the lawsuit could have a chilling effect on shareholder proposals that can be a tool to agitate for change at companies.
Exxon’s lawsuit “is very aggressive and we are concerned about the implications for shareholders rights”, Nicolai Tangen, chief executive of Norway’s $1.5tn oil fund, told my colleagues this week. The fund said it had supported similar types of proposals that Exxon was now challenging.
Shareholders are also feeling threatened not just by corporate management but also by government politicians. In Italy, lawmakers this week advanced legislation to juice up the country’s soporific public listings market, and international investors are furious they are being slighted in the process.
