ShareSoc News

ShareSoc celebrates second anniversary

PRESS RELEASE 43 (01/03/2013) In February 2010 the UK Individual Shareholders Society (ShareSoc) was launched as an organisation to represent private investors. Since then the Society has recruited over 2,500 members and has actively worked to promote their interests. ShareSoc has run a number of campaigns on companies where we identified significant issues of concern to shareholders including Rensburg AIM VCT, Graphite Enterprise, Intercede Group, Lighthouse Group and BAE Systems, and achieved significant share price performance improvement in the first two. Intercede ...

Test of “Proper Purpose” Company Law at Red Rock

PRESS RELEASE 42 (25/01/2013) Yesterday an initial hearing in the High Court took place on a challenge by the directors of Red Rock Resources Plc to a request for a copy of their share register by Gary Carp, a shareholder in the company. Since the 2006 Companies Act was introduced, any person requesting a copy of the share register of a company must have a “proper purpose”. This was designed to frustrate those who wanted to harass shareholders (such as animal rights ...

ShareSoc’s Response To The LSE’s Consultation On The Trading Of Smaller Equity Securities

ShareSoc submitted the following response to the consultation by the LSE on the trading of smaller equity securities: TradingSmallerEquities

ShareSoc’s Response to the New Capital Regime for Self-Invested Personal (SIPP) Consultation

ShareSoc responded to the consultation on the capital requirements of SIPP operators in this letter: SIPP_Response

ShareSoc’s Response to the Retail Prices Index Consultation

ShareSoc submitted this response to the consultation on possible changes to the Retail Prices Index (RPI): RPI_Response

ShareSoc Launches AIM Company Rating System

PRESS RELEASE 41 (26/11/2012) ShareSoc has been concerned for some time with the quality of companies on AIM. Private investors often get sucked into investing in companies with poor corporate governance, poor basic infrastructure, no track record, and with incompetent or untrustworthy directors. New AIM IPOs are particularly problematic with companies frequently failing or subsequently delisting. But how can investors sort the wheat from the chaff? ShareSoc has devised a simple tool to help investors differentiate between good companies and those that ...

ShareSoc and First Flight issue Recommended Code of Conduct for Non-Executive Directors

PRESS RELEASE 38 (7/11/2012) The importance of having active and competent Non-Executive Directors (including Chairmen) in public companies cannot be over emphasised. They can make all the difference between the long term success or failure of a business, and are crucial when a company faces short term difficulties. But many major corporate failures or near disasters such as RBS, BP, Northern Rock, AIG, Enron and more recently Olympus, News Corporation, Barclays etc have been assigned to an “inability of the Non-Execs to exercise influence ...

ShareSoc Recommends Voting Against New Performance Fee at Dunedin Enterprise Investment Trust

PRESS RELEASE 39 (24/10/2012) Dunedin Enterprise Investment Trust Plc has announced proposals for a new Performance Fee for the managers of this private equity investment trust. Like other such trusts, it trades at a substantial discount to net asset value. To tackle this issue they decided on a change of investment policy some time ago which involves selling some of their investments in third party funds and returning cash to shareholders. This will of course reduce the size of the fund significantly. ...

ShareSoc Calls for Change at the Top of BAE Systems Plc

PRESS RELEASE 40 (23/10/2012) Following the collapse of the merger talks between BAE Systems and EADS, ShareSoc is launching a campaign which calls for the Chairman and Chief Executive of the company to step down. In our view the idea that this merger would gain the widespread support of shareholders (including the votes controlled by other European Governments in EADS) was misconceived from the beginning. In addition we have seen no good business justification put forward for the merger, and it potentially ...

ShareSoc welcomes Miliband focus on pension rip-off

PRESS RELEASE 37 (30/09/2012) In his speech today, Ed Miliband highlights the impact of pension provider fees on returns to savers. Even when costs are declared, they are not done in a way in which typical pension savers and small employers are likely to understand, according to a recent report for the insurance firm RSA by David Pitt-Watson. An extra 2% annual charge can result in a halving of the pension benefit paid out to savers. Not for profit organisation ShareSoc, advocates that pension savers ...