Stonex say it's not about the winning as Rothschild loses Bumi battle

Cato Stonex, one of the founders of THS Partners, believes the focus on who wins the Bumi board vote is overplayed and improving corporate governance needs to be the key consideration.

The mining company underwent a shareholder meeting yesterday to vote on co-founder Nat Rothschild’s proposals to overhaul the board, to remove 12 of its 14 directors.

Rothschild subsequently lost the vote, with 19 of his 22 resolutions rejected. This included a proposal for him to return to the board.

He drew some consolation from the departure of chairman Samin Tan, who Rothschild had targeted in his campaign against the firm.

After the vote Rothschild urged Bumi's eight non-executive directors to resign, saying they had 'lost the confidence of the majority of non-aligned shareholders'.

This claim was dismissed by Bumi chief executive Nick Von Schirnding who said: ' I just really want to put these two months of infighting behind us and move on, because our long-suffering shareholders deserve better.'

Rothschild had garnered support from firms such as Artemis, although other major shareholders including Standard Life Investments had expressed their opposition.

Stonex said the main concern should be that corporate governance improves regardless of the board’s composition, and that he is not ‘so excited about this personality’ story.

‘It’s not a matter of winning,’ said Stonex. ‘This is not like a football match, because the game doesn’t stop after 90 minutes. If it’s not on this occasion that the board changes, then next time round it likely will.  This is an ongoing process.

‘Our main concern is that they avoid repetition of alleged fraudulent activities.’