The California Public Employees' Retirement System said it is
pushing for governance changes at three companies it is invested
in, chiefly focusing on executive compensation, supermajority and
plurality voting requirements.
It said it supports a proposal for Chesapeake Energy Corp.'s
(CHK) June 8 annual meeting that would remove a 67% supermajority
voting requirement to amend or adopt new bylaws for the natural-gas
producer.
At New York Community Bancorp Inc. (NYB), CalPERS is seeking to
remove a plurality vote standard in favor of a majority vote
standard at the banking company's June 7 annual meeting.
For Nabors Industries Ltd. (NBR), CalPERS will push for
shareholder approval of future severance agreements during the
drilling contractor's June 5 meeting. Nabors was criticized
recently for disclosing a $100 million severance-style deal for its
departing chief executive, Eugene Isenberg, who later agreed to
waive his rights to the payment. The payment would have been one of
the largest executive paydays in recent years.
-By Ben Fox Rubin, Dow Jones Newswires; 212-416-3108; ben.rubin@dowjones.com