LOS ANGELES – As expected, two shareholder resolutions challenging how the Walt Disney Company is managed were defeated on Wednesday at the entertainment conglomerate’s annual meeting in Phoenix.
At the same time, slightly more Disney shareholders supported the company in a federally required say-on-pay test, in which executive compensation is put to a vote. About 57.6 percent of shareholders supported Disney’s pay package for Robert A. Iger, chairman and chief executive, up from 56.9 percent last year.
Mr. Iger’s pay for 2012 totaled $40.2 million, a 20 percent increase from a year earlier. His compensation is largely tied to Disney’s financial performance; profit soared 18 percent last year, to $5.7 billion.
Because of its high profile, Disney is a routine target for shareholder advocates. But the company’s strong performance recently made this year’s push a difficult one. A proposal to allow some stock owners to nominate board candidates failed with only 39.8 percent of voters supporting it.
The more controversial proposal involved forcing the company to prevent future chief executives from also holding the title of board chairman. Mr. Iger has held both top jobs since last March. This proposal only received support from 35.2 percent of shareholders, despite media reports in recent weeks that Mr. Iger was under fire.
Speaking during the comment section of the meeting, Roy P. Disney, the grandson of the company’s co-founder, took aim at shareholder advocates. “It’s unfortunate that this company should be used as a podium” for those seeking to make a point about corporate governance, he said.
All 10 members of Disney’s board were also re-elected.
As part of the meeting, Mr. Iger showed a model of the castle planned as the centerpiece of a sprawling new theme park resort under construction in Shanghai. The Enchanted Storybook Castle, as Disney called it, is by far the largest featured at any Disney park and looked a smidge like the Hogwarts castle from the Harry Potter movies.
In one of the gathering’s livelier moments, a shareholder identifying himself as Dwight Morgan complained about Disney for the first time opening a Starbucks inside the Disneyland Resort in California; in particular Mr. Morgan was concerned about the role potentially played by Orin C. Smith, a Disney board member and the retired chief executive of Starbucks.
“I’ve heard nothing but bad comments,” Mr. Morgan said.
Mr. Iger responded that the deal was independently vetted and came after years of guest complaints about the quality of Disney’s coffee. “I don’t mean to be cheeky,” Mr. Iger said, “but that has become one of the most popular Starbucks in the country, and we’re going to add more.”
Article source: http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/06/disney-shareholders-endorse-pay-of-chief-executive/?partner=rss&emc=rss
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