Notably, the principal proponents of shutting down shareholder activism are not investors, but legal advisors who “defend” companies from activists and profit from this activity. The anti-activists justify their attacks against activism by conflating short-termism with activism. We are strongly in agreement that short-termism is bad for the long-term health of companies and industries, but successful shareholder activism is not short-termism. It is hard to argue that the changes we have wrought at Canadian Pacific, General Growth, Air Products, McDonald’s, Fortune Brands, Wendy’s, Howard Hughes, to name a few were those of a short-term investor. Our target holding…
Ackman Going Public, Should Mega Cap Stocks Worry?
Mark Melin
Mark Melin is an alternative investment practitioner whose specialty is recognizing the impact of beta market environment on a technical trading strategy. A portfolio and industry consultant, wrote or edited three books including High Performance Managed Futures (Wiley 2010) and The Chicago Board of Trade’s Handbook of Futures and Options (McGraw-Hill 2008) and taught a course at Northwestern University's executive education program.