One Judge Finds 61, While Another Calls a Balk on Musk’s Search for Bots | |
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While Aaron Judge’s bat finally found its 61st home run of the season in a big win for the Yankees and Mets fans bit their nails all week heading into a showdown with friends from Atlanta, Elon Musk whiffed this week in Delaware and was all but accused of stealing signals. Twitter claims that Musk has been withholding messages exchanged via Signal, an encrypted messaging app that has an auto-delete feature, after the company discovered a screenshot of a message between the Tesla CEO and parties relevant to the deal. This revelation led Twitter to ask Delaware Chancery Court Chief Justice Kathaleen McCormick to sanction Musk, which she will rule on in the coming days.
To make matters worse for Musk, his appointed data firms reviewing the number of bots on Twitter have concluded that the make-up on the platform is between 5% and 11% of all users – nowhere near the > 20% threshold Musk continues to claim. With doubt in the air for Team Musk, law professor and M&A expert Robert Miller weighed in on the case to Insider’s Kali Hays, giving Musk a 10% chance of victory.
Meanwhile, in a new feature called Dealmakers in Midtown Getting Coffee, we took a walk with proxy solicitor Scott Winter, Managing Director at Innisfree, to talk about the upcoming proxy season and how activists plan on taking advantage of the universal proxy. While no activists dropped white papers at @Delivering Alpha this week, they lurked in the shadows. Scott expects a busy season but potentially less proxy fights. Big activist names like Elliott and Starboard are already “as active as anyone can be.” Instead, look for small and mid-cap activists to take advantage of the new rules that make it easier to nominate directors.
Have a great weekend,
GPP Team
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Gladstone Place Partners: Interview with Scott Winter, Innisfree
Listen Here
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Business Insider: Elon Musk Will Be Forced to Acquire Twitter for $44 billion, Says a Top M&A Legal Expert Who Warns that the Billionaire is 'In Trouble' as He Heads to Court
As Elon Musk prepares for trial, M&A Law Professor Robert Miller joins Business Insider's Kali Hays to discuss the upcoming Twitter vs. Musk trial and speculates that "Elon is in trouble." Read More
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The Chancery Daily: Twitter v. Musk Spotlight
The @chancery_daily Twitter account provides comprehensive daily updates on the Twitter vs. Musk trial including deposition analysis, lessons on legal jargon, fun memes and more. Humorous commentary from Tuesday’s hearing included play by plays from the courtroom. Read More
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Axios: Exclusive: Warren, Other Lawmakers Ask FTC to Block Amazon Deal
Jennifer Saba of Breakingviews writes that recent regulatory changes relating to proxy fights has propelled activist investors to take a toned-down approach when making their demands. Read More
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Business Insider: Elon Musk's Own Data Scientists Couldn't Find Many Bots on Twitter, and He Hid that Crucial Information, the Company Says
Kali Hays and Grace Kay report that Elon Musk's team of data scientists failed to find data confirming his claim that at least 20% of Twitter accounts are bots. Read More
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WSJ: VW Prices Porsche IPO at Top of Range
Ben Dummett reports that VW's pricing of the Porsche IPO sets it up to be one of Europe’s largest IPOs and reflects investor confidence in the demand amid current market conditions. Read More
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Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance: How Boards Can Assess the Potential and Readiness of Future CEOs
In a new essay, Russell Reynolds Associates’ Justus O’Brien argues that CEO succession planning is most effective when it functions as an ongoing process and continuous pipeline that replenishes a company with future leaders. Read More
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Axios Pro Retail: Purpose Adopts Poison Pill
After an unsolicited takeover bid from Coliseum Capital Management due to slowing demand and sales of mattresses, Purple Innovation adopted a poison pill this week to stop the takeover. Read More
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The Deal: Activists, Companies Clash Over SEC's 'Groups' Rule Fix
A new rule proposed by the SEC would shorten the disclosure of 13D filings from ten days to five. The ability for passive institutional investors to communicate with activist investors may be negatively impacted as a result of the rule. Read More
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Financial Times: Healthcare M&A: Titans on spree as regulatory crackdown falls flat
The FT's Lex newsletter argues that a recent federal judge ruling, which stopped the DOJ’s attempt to block UnitedHealth Group's acquisition of Change Healthcare, will likely boost M&A within healthcare. Read More
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Fortune: ESG Investor Proposals are Booming, Fueled Partly By Conservative Groups Critical of ‘Anti-Racist’ Corporate Trainings
New data from the Conference Board and ESGAUGE reaffirmed the high level of ESG shareholder proposal activity, particularly around climate issues, at S&P 500 and Russell 3000 companies. It’s at the highest level in five years. Read More
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Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance: ESG, Stakeholder Governance, and the Duty of the Corporation
In a new essay, Martin Lipton, founding partner of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, rejects Milton Friedman’s shareholder-centric views of corporate purpose and argues corporations have a legal responsibility to look beyond their shareholders through sustainable investment strategies. Read More
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CNBC: ESG Without Returns is ‘Simply Not Sustainable,’ Says Investor Lauren Taylor Wolfe
The ongoing ESG debate continued at CNBC’s Delivering Alpha this week, with a lively conversation on the importance of returns within ESG investing and how ESG tools can be used to drive returns. Read More
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FROM OUR DESK TO YOURS
Fall sweater weather is in full swing, and GPPers will be curling up this weekend with the latest in business reads and watches out now. This week, former AOL CEO Steve Case released The Rise of the Rest, where he takes readers inside how some of the most groundbreaking entrepreneurs and companies around the country are reshaping business and innovation, and their impact on local economies outside of established tech hubs.
More of a movie buff? Head over to Netflix to watch Skandal!, a new documentary based on Financial Times reporter Dan McCrum’s reporting and subsequent book, Money Men: A Hot Startup, A Billion Dollar Fraud, A Fight for the Truth, on the rise and fall of the once high-flying German fintech Wirecard.
A few GPPers this week dropped by Nasdaq MarketSite for a tour of the building including the studio home to CNBC’s Squawk Box and got the chance to take some photos by the opening bell and hear from members of the Nasdaq team on the process and excitement of an IPO day.
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PEOPLE MOVES
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Kent Penwell, Tim Wiedelmann and John Anos will be global co-heads of financial sponsors at Deutsche Bank AG, leading the firm’s private equity dealmaking division. Read More
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Matt Monks at Bloomberg has been promoted to Team Leader on the US deals team, a team he’s been on for more than ten years as editor and reporter. Read More
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Jeffrey Goldfarb has been appointed Global Corporate Finance Editor for Breakingviews, a role that brings him to New York from Hong Kong, where he was previously Asia Editor. Read More
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Bernie Adcock is stepping down from his role as chief supply chain officer at Beyond Meat. Read More
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