Home Depot Approves Majority Voting

Following the governance precedent set by several other major companies earlier this year, The Home Depot adopted a majority voting standard for the election of its directors on Tuesday. The new voting standard goes into effective in May 2007, which will affect the company’s next board election.T...

By Helen Shaw • Aug. 30, 2006

Investors Back Shareholder Resolutions

Investors are increasingly supporting shareholder resolutions calling for change in a company’s corporate governance practices. On average, eight of 11 different measures received more support this past year than during the 2005 proxy voting season, according to a preliminary Institutional Shareh...

By Stephen Taub • Aug. 22, 2006

Explore the Trendline➔

Tax policy shifts: What CFOs need to know to stay ahead

Discover how evolving tax policies are creating new opportunities and challenges for CFOs.

By CFO.com staff

San Diego Report Eyes Expanded CFO Role

Among a bevy of recommendations to cure the ills that they say led to widespread mismanagement and legal violations within San Diego’s government, the authors of an independent audit committee report are calling on the city to strengthen the role and accountability of its chief financial officer....

By Stephen Taub and David Katz • Aug. 10, 2006

Ousted Atmel CEO Fires Back

Atmel Corp. Monday announced that its board of directors fired CEO George Perlegos, executive vice president Gust Perlegos, and two other executives following an independent investigation into allegations regarding the misuse of corporate travel funds.George Perlegos and Gust Perlegos were also a...

By Stephen Taub • Aug. 7, 2006

CEO-as-Chairman Still the Rule in US

Lead independent director or non-executive chairman?This is the choice companies are making these days to meet governance standards.So far, it’s clear that most companies in the US are more comfortable with the former rather than splitting up the CEO and chairman roles.According to a new report f...

By Stephen Taub • Aug. 3, 2006

Delaware Rules

Reporters descending on the hamlet of Georgetown for The Walt Disney Co.’s Delaware Court of Chancery trial poked fun at the Mayberry-like setting. In Vanity Fair’s February 2005 account of the shareholders’ star-studded battle to recover the $130 million severance paid to president Michael Ovitz...

By Roy Harris • Aug. 1, 2006

Clear Channel Adopts Majority Voting

Clear Channel Communications is the latest among a growing number of companies to institute some sort of majority vote requirement for electing directors.In the case of the radio owner and advertising company, it has amended its bylaws to change the vote standard for the election of directors fro...

By Stephen Taub • July 31, 2006

Wilson Resigns from Disney’s Board

Walt Disney Co. announced that long-time director and one-time chief financial officer Gary Wilson has resigned from the board under its term limits provision.Wilson, who has been a director with the media giant for 21 years, resigned under the company’s “length of service” policy which are part ...

By Stephen Taub • July 31, 2006

Phony Katrina Claim Costs CEO $100K

The former chief executive officer of a water-treatment company, who allegedly made false claims about the company’s involvement in Hurricane Katrina relief efforts, has agreed to pay $100,000 to settle charges by the Securities and Exchange Commission.The commission’s complaint charges that Denn...

By Stephen Taub • July 7, 2006

ABB Employees Settle Bribery Charges

Four former ABB Ltd. employees, including a former finance executive, have agreed to settle civil charges with the Securities and Exchange Commission that they violated the anti-bribery provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.The four are Ian N. Campbell, a former vice president of financ...

By Stephen Taub • July 6, 2006

Say Yes to Dr. No?

In 1917 the U.S. Navy was in a panic over German U-boats, which had been sinking American ships in the Atlantic. Henry Ford, who had earlier boasted that his assembly lines could push out a thousand submarines a day, offered his company’s services. If he could build cars, he reasoned, why not boa...

By Don Durfee • July 1, 2006

Apparel Company Puts Execs on Leave

Apparel manufacturer Hampshire Group has place three top executives on administrative leave as the company’s audit committee investigates of a host of issues.The three individuals are chief executive officer Ludwig Kuttner; executive vice president and treasurer Charles Clayton, also the former c...

By Stephen Taub • June 22, 2006

Time Warner CFO Named by Alleged Madam

The chief financial officer of Time Warner has been identified by alleged prostitute and madam Andreia Schwartz as one of her “sugar daddies,” according to reports published over the weekend by The New York Post and The New York Daily News.Both papers reported Schwartz’s arrest last Wednesday on ...

By Stephen Taub • June 19, 2006

HealthSouth Ex-Controller Gets Eight Years in Prison

Hannibal “Sonny” Crumpler, a former HealthSouth finance executive, was sentenced to eight years in prison for his role in the company’s $2.7 billion accounting scandal, the Associated Press has reported. This is the longest term given to anyone at the company.Crumpler, former controller of the co...

By Stephen Taub • June 16, 2006

Cisco Combines Chairman and CEO Roles

Bucking a widespread trend , Cisco Systems has tapped John Chambers to succeed John Morgridge as chairman and to continue to serve as the company’s CEO. The appointment will go into effect in November, when Cisco holds its annual shareholder meeting.The decision, the result of a unanimous vote by...

By Stephen Taub • June 9, 2006

Buffet of Fraud Charges at Buca

Criminal and civil fraud charges were filed Wednesday against several former executives of Buca Inc., which operates 104 Italian restaurants in 28 states under the names Buca di Beppo and Vinny T’s.The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota handed up criminal charges against former ...

By Stephen Taub • June 7, 2006

Humble Depot?

Home Depot Inc. CFO Carol Tomé said the week since its contentious May 25 annual meeting had “been really miserable,” and that negative shareholder reactions had led the company to reject the minimalist meeting format it had installed. The company said on Thursday that it would return to its prev...

By Roy Harris • June 5, 2006

Governance: It’s a Regional Thing

“Corporate governance” means many things to many institutional investors, often depending on where in the world they operate, according to a new report by Institutional Shareholder Services.For example, 34 percent of U.S. institutional investors say “enhanced returns” are the most significant adv...

By Marie Leone • June 2, 2006

Inside the Chamber

From his office on the fourth floor of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce building in Washington, D.C., Thomas Donohue commands a grand view of Lafayette Park, abloom with flowers, and, beyond that, glimmering in the sun, the White House. On his desk, Donohue keeps a blunt reminder of what it takes to ...

By P.B. Gray • June 1, 2006

TV Azteca Execs Propose Settlement

TV Azteca, Mexico’s second-largest broadcaster, has proposed a settlement to a Securities and Exchange Commission lawsuit filed last year over allegations of improper self-dealing.The SEC lawsuit was the first brought under Sarbanes-Oxley against an executive of a foreign company, reported The Wa...

By Stephen Taub and Dave Cook • May 30, 2006

Fannie Changes Audit Committee Chair

The Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA, or Fannie Mae) has replaced the head of its audit committee.Dennis Beresford, a former chairman of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, will join the embattled mortgage finance company as a director and as audit committee chairman.He succeeds ...

By Stephen Taub • May 22, 2006

Majority Voting Picking Up Steam

As the proxy season winds down, majority voting was very clearly one of the hottest issues.According to Claudia Allen of law firm Neal, Gerber & Eisenberg, who updated a study she first published in February, at least 20 majority-vote proposals passed during the 2006 proxy season, 16 of them ...

By Stephen Taub • May 19, 2006

Raytheon Chief Penalized for Plagiarism

Raytheon chief executive William Swanson is paying a hefty price for committing plagiarism.The world’s largest maker of missiles announced on Wednesday that it would not raise Swanson’s salary above its 2005 level, and will reduce the amount of restricted stock for which he is eligible in the com...

By Stephen Taub • May 3, 2006

Proxy Fight Shakes Up Motient Board

The latest twist in the Motient Corp. proxy battle is the imminent exit of five of the company’s 10 directors.Officials at the company, which provides two-way wireless communications, announced that the five board members will not stand for re-election at this year’s annual meeting. The meeting h...

By Stephen Taub • May 3, 2006

UnitedHealth Overhauls Governance

UnitedHealth Group Inc., whose board of directors is facing a shareholder revolt at its May 2 annual meeting as a result of the $1.6 billion in stock options held by chairman and CEO William McGuire, has announced a slew of corporate-governance changes.“These changes represent substantial further...

By Stephen Taub • April 28, 2006