Feb

15

Empty Voting, from Gordon Haave

February 15, 2007 |

 'Empty voting' ploy used by hedge funds is on SEC's radar By David Hoffman February 12, 2007

PHILADELPHIA — The practice of borrowing company stock to manipulate the outcome of company votes has piqued the interest of the Securities and Exchange Commission and has rekindled a debate over stock lending. In at least two speeches this year, SEC member Paul S. Atkins talked about the practice, which has been dubbed 'empty voting.'

If investor A doesn't care about the outcome of a vote, and investor B does, why shouldn't investor B be able to pay investor A for the right to vote investor A's shares?

This is in fact economics at its best. If investor B's voting harmed the long term interests of Investor A, then investor A wouldn't lend investor B the shares.


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