据知情人士透露，D.E. Shaw计划提名包括Olin前CEO Scott Sutton在内的三名董事加入Air Products的董事会。这一行动得到了另一激进基金Mantle Ridge的支持，他们共同的目标是推动公司为80岁的现任CEO Seifi Ghasemi制定一个明确的接班人计划，Ghasemi是标普500指数公司中年龄最大的CEO之一。Hedge fund D.E. Shaw nominated three directors to the Air Products board of directors and promoted the company's return to its past successful business strategy. D.E. Shaw believes that the company mishandled succession plans and executive compensation. Earlier, Mantle Ridge, another aggressive investor, also disclosed its holdings of about 1 billion US dollars in shares.
D.E. Shaw, a world-renowned hedge fund, announced on Thursday that it has accumulated about 1 billion US dollars of shares in the US industrial gas giant Air Products and Chemicals and has become the company's second-largest aggressive investor.
Activist investors are investors who actively participate in corporate governance and management decisions after purchasing a large number of shares in a company. DE Shaw is one of the world's largest hedge funds by asset size, and although D.E. Shaw tried to privately communicate with Air Products, it was rejected by Air Products.
According to people familiar with the matter, D.E. Shaw plans to nominate three directors, including former Olin CEO Scott Sutton, to join Air Products' board of directors. The move was supported by Mantle Ridge, another activist fund. Their common goal is to push the company to develop a clear succession plan for current CEO Seifi Ghasemi, who is 80 years old. Ghasemi is one of the oldest CEOs of S&P 500 companies.
D.E. Shaw expressed dissatisfaction with Air Products' practices in some major deals. Generally speaking, large infrastructure projects will have an “offtake agreement”. This is like buying insurance for the investment to ensure that the project investors can make a steady profit. However, D.E. Shaw notes that Air Products has launched multi-billion dollar hydrogen energy projects, but there are no “offtake agreements” for these projects.
D.E. Shaw believes that this unconventional approach may be one reason why Air Products' performance lags behind the historical average and other peers. Meanwhile, despite the success of rivals such as Linde (Linde) on low-risk projects using offtake agreements, Air Products' CEO Ghasemi stuck to his strategy.
Furthermore, D.E. Shaw Fund, Mantle Ridge Fund, and many analysts feel that the company's contract for CEO Ghasemi is too generous, and there are no good plans for who will succeed him after his retirement. In his letter, D.E. Shaw questioned whether the company's board of directors is really handling the issue of CEO succession.
Although D.E. Shaw is currently seeking only three members on the board of directors, the Mantle Ridge Foundation's intentions are more aggressive, and they intend to control the entire board through a proxy battle.
