For the proxy season, we are now at a total of five lawsuits filed after Rule 14a-8(j) notices were sent to the SEC, as two new lawsuits were filed since I last blogged that two of these lawsuits had settled (with the company agreeing to include the proposal in their proxy as part of each settlement).
The two new lawsuits are:
- As You Sow filing this complaint in the US District Court for the District of Columbia over a shareholder proposal seeking a climate change-related report. The Rule 14a-8(j) notice reveals that the company included a detailed mini-no-action analysis.
- The New York State Comptroller filing this lawsuit in the US District Court for the District of Massachusetts over a shareholder proposal on deforestation risks (per this Responsible Investor article. We don’t know the nature of the company’s arguments because Corp Fin is behind in posting its responses to Rule 14a-8(j) notices (with the last responses being posted on February 13th).
Authored by
Broc Romanek