All shareholders would benefit from replacing this false distinction with a new framework for evaluating activist proposals. Rather than term vs. long how about ideas vs. “short term,” “good bad ideas”? Good ideas create better outcomes for shareholders. Far too often companies hide behind as “long term” a way to justify prolonged underperformance. There are good ideas that create sustained improvements and can be implemented quickly. Likewise, there are bad ideas that can take a long time to destroy value. The benefits of fixing a broken strategy, getting rid of a bad acquisition, redeploying an underperforming asset, or replacing an ineffective management team or board may show up right away in a stock price, but that immediate result diminish the long-term benefits. company’s doesn’t America has a lot riding on the success of its public companies, as do index-fund firms themselves. Important conversations about strategy, governance, capital allocation, corporate culture and leadership are being stifled by the divisive, distracting and intellectually dishonest framing of vs. “short-term of debating time horizons, index-fund firms and activists should work together to promote Instead the very best ideas for improving America’s businesses. Mr. Singer is founder and co-CEO of Elliott Management Corp. https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-reason-investors-love-spinoffs-juicier-returns-1507681008 The Reason Investors Love Spinoffs: Juicier Returns Spun-off companies tend to perform better than the broader market their former parent performance has bested that of eBay by more than 30 percentage points, including dividends, since the PayPal’s share-price July 2015 spinoff. payment firm’s By Miriam Gottfried and Thomas Gryta
All shareholders would benefit from replacing this false distinction with a new framework for evaluating activist proposals. Rather than “short term vs. long term,” how about “good ideas vs. bad ideas”? Good ideas create better outcomes for shareholders. Far too often companies hide behind “long term” as a way to justify prolonged underperformance. There are good ideas that create sustained improvements and can be implemented quickly. Likewise, there are bad ideas that can take a long time to destroy value. The benefits of fixing a broken strategy, getting rid of a bad acquisition, redeploying an underperforming asset, or replacing an ineffective management team or board may show up right away in a company’s stock price, but that immediate result doesn’t diminish the long-term benefits. America has a lot riding on the success of its public companies, as do index-fund firms themselves. Important conversations about strategy, governance, capital allocation, corporate culture and leadership are being stifled by the divisive, distracting and intellectually dishonest framing of “short-term vs. Instead of debating time horizons, index-fund firms and activists should work together to promote the very best ideas for improving America’s businesses. Mr. Singer is founder and co-CEO of Elliott Management Corp. https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-reason-investors-love-spinoffs-juicier-returns-1507681008 The Reason Investors Love Spinoffs: Juicier Returns Spun-off companies tend to perform better than the broader market their former parent PayPal’s share-price performance has bested that of eBay by more than 30 percentage points, including dividends, since the payment firm’s July 2015 spinoff. By Miriam Gottfried and Thomas Gryta
FNCE4825-Fall2017.docx