Money talks

Of all the subjects in corporate governance, executive pay is obviously the least controversial. So says no one.

It is perhaps perplexing, then, to find a story in The Times at the weekend speculating that the government is about to remove the right of investors to vote on boardroom pay deals.

According to The Times, the proposal will form part of a consultation on reforms that will come within measures to modernise corporate reporting.

Another measure could be giving boards the right to host online-only AGMs (a recent vote at BP’s AGM should serve to remind everyone how popular that measure proved).

Anyway, a proposal to end votes on pay looks to be an eyebrow-raiser among investors.

The Times quotes a spokesperson saying that government is determined to “streamline company law” to make it “fit for the 21st century”. As they did with audit reform (another crowd pleaser).

As Gen Z likes to say, better get the popcorn in.

Ifs and bots

Over at the Financial Times, concern turned this week to whether boards should appoint an AI bot to have on hand and help make decisions as a de facto director.

Regular readers will know Board Agenda has been writing on this topic since 2020.

Pippa Begg of Board Intelligence tells the FT that attitudes have changed among FTSE 100 directors from “let’s not” to “I think we need to do something. How do we do it safely and securely?”

This is going to be another interesting one for investors to mull. Let’s add a gargantuan fizzy drink to that popcorn order.

To boldly go

Elon Musk never fails to make the Board Agenda team snort their morning coffee over their iPads. This week, it was a Reuters report on Musk’s position at SpaceX, his personal Star Trek venture.

Apparently, Reuters have seen SpaceX articles which suggest that Musk can only be fired by… Musk! The mechanism is Musk “can only be removed from our board or these positions by the vote of Class B holders” which are “super voting shares”. Guess which high-flyer will control these after the IPO lift-off? You may not need us to spell out the co-ordinates on that one.

One wonders how many investors will chart a new course once they read the news?