Disney and CEO Iger Get Backing of Proxy-Advisory Firm Glass Lewis in Battle Over Board

variety.com:

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Disney‘s current strategic direction under CEO Bob Iger got the thumbs-up from independent proxy voting and corporate governance advisory firm Glass Lewis, amid a campaign launched by two activist investor groups to win seats on the Mouse House’s board.

Glass Lewis, in a March 18 report, recommended Disney shareholders vote for the Disney-selected 12 director nominees — and reject those put forward by Nelson Peltz‘s Trian Partners and another firm, Blackwells Capital — at the company’s annual meeting on April 3.

Disney “is undertaking what we consider to be a credible effort to shift key operational priorities under the leadership of one of the most well-respected CEOs in the industry,” Glass Lewis said in the report, referring to Iger. “[W]e consider the subsequent 15 months [since Iger’s return as CEO] have provided management and an incrementally reconstituted board with adequate opportunity to launch a more credible succession program and develop, communicate and execute on several key initiatives which appear to reasonably target acknowledged operational and financial weaknesses at Disney.” Glass Lewis also said, “While it remains too early to say with certainty that each of those programs will prove successful, we believe it is similarly too early to suggest there exists adequate cause for investors to support alternate solicitations which may prove significantly less accretive to Disney’s trajectory, by comparison.” Trian — which has asserted Disney’s stock has underperformed under Iger — has been lobbying Disney investors to vote in Peltz and Jay Rasulo, former CFO at Disney, at the annual shareholders meeting.