HomeStreet's board nominees were re-elected following a heated battle with an activist shareholder.
The $6.9 billion-asset company said in a press release Thursday that a majority of shares cast supported Scott Boggs, Douglas Smith and Mark Patterson. HomeStreet said all of its proposals, including a nonbinding measure backing annual votes on executive compensation, passed.
Actual tallies were not disclosed.
HomeStreet had previously said that Roaring Blue Lion, which led an effort opposing Boggs and Smith, failed to get the
Roaring Blue Lion Capital, which owns about 6% of HomeStreet’s shares, first tried to have its own nominees vie for board seats but the effort was invalidated because the firm failed to comply with the banking company’s advance-notice bylaw. That decision was upheld in court.
HomeStreet said on Thursday that it would have prevailed even if it had officially counted Roaring Blue Lion’s proxy cards, which it accepted on a provisional basis.
HomeStreet will evaluate board composition and corporate governance to “ensure that we are taking the right steps to position the company for success," Mark Mason, the company's president and CEO, said in the release.
“We also appreciate the willingness of our shareholders to engage with the company in discussing our governance practices over the course of the coming year,” Mason added. “Most importantly, we look forward to further dialogue with our shareholders — as well as our customers, employees and partners — around how best to maximize the potential of HomeStreet moving forward.”
