By Paul Hodgson – CCO and Senior Research Associate
Corporate governance checkmate – Queen Takes Knight
Events Team Leader Mark Magee had already spotted this when I found it in the FT, but we’re doing it again because he came up with a great headline and for no other reason.
This is about the former CEO of RBS being stripped of his knighthood.
What else do you need to say?
Strictly a need to know basis and… you don't need to know
Events Analyst Dovid Muyderman called this blockage out from a January 31st 8-K from Polypore International.
Polypore International, Inc. (NYSE: PPO) issued the following statement from Robert B. Toth, President and Chief Executive Officer:
“Typically, the company does not comment on industry news. Polypore has no new news to report. We remain confident in the premises used to justify the lithium battery separator capacity expansions associated with accelerating industry demand for electric drive vehicles.”
Does anyone even know what that means?
Executive Title of the Week Award
Compensation Analyst Ashley Kotzur found this in Maximus’ 2011 proxy statement.
Chief of Human Capital and President Tax and Employer Services — Mark S. Andrekovich
“What do you do, again?”
“I’m Chief of Human Capital and President Tax and Employer Services at Maximus.”
“And what was it you did, again?”
Slime and Salmonella
As Mark says, to more reasons to avoid fast food entirely.
Pink slime removed from McDonald’s burgers — but other food additives remain. On Wednesday, McDonald’s announced the product was no longer used in their burgers, Time reports. “This decision was a result of our efforts to align our global standards for how we source beef around the world,” Todd Bacon, senior director of quality systems for McDonald's, said in a statement.
Wow, discarded beef treated with ammonium hydroxide is called pink slime and they used – until very recently – to put it in McDonald’s hamburgers. How gross is that. My wife, who’s American, used to sing this song about the ingredients in McDonald’s with her buddies. They all seemed to know it. Something about blah blah blah in a sesame seed bun. Clearly they were unaware of the actual ingredients. Or was this some McDonald’s advertisement song? I neither know, nor care.
Yum Brand Inc's Taco Bell chain has been linked to a salmonella outbreak that sickened 68 people in 10 states late last year.
To be fair to Taco Bell, some people got salmonella from LETTUCE in 2011, never mind tacos. But, still.
And Dovid found this in a January 31st 8-K from PartnerRe.
PartnerRe Ltd. (NYSE, Euronext: PRE) today announced that during the January 1, 2012 treaty renewal season it expects to write and bind approximately $1.9 billion of Non-Life treaty premium. On a constant foreign exchange basis, this represents an increase of 2% from the renewable premium base.
Non-life, I ask you. And shouldn’t that be premia? Don’t these people know Latin?