KB Financial Group management has averted a revolt among foreign shareholders over its business policies.
The voting result at the annual shareholder meeting of KB Financial, which was held Friday, showed that its management successfully dispelled misunderstandings of foreign shareholders, who hold a 65 percent stake in the group.
KB Financial Group chairman Euh Yoon-dae (right) shakes hands with outside directors after a shareholders’ meeting at the group’s headquarters in Seoul on Friday. (Yonhap News)
Though some had raised the possibility that the majority of its shareholders could cast dissenting ballots against the reappointment of KB Financial’s outside directors, 66.5 percent of the total participants (with collective voting rights for about 355.4 million shares) voted for the proposition.
The worries over a possible revolt from dominant foreign shareholders had come due to groundless internal information delivered to Institutional Shareholder Services Inc., a global research firm.
KB Financial management, including chairman Euh Yoon-dae, had been suspected of masterminding a scheme to oust some outside directors, dispatched from financial authorities, after the group failed to take over ING Life Korea.
“But the scheme was solely initiated by senior executive Park Dong-chang, Euh’s close aide as deputy president and chief strategy officer,” according to group officials.
Park, who was recently dismissed by Euh, allegedly notified the U.S.-based ISS that some government-friendly outside directors sought to block KB Financial’s ING Life takeover bid in late 2012.
Contrary to his claims, the failure in the M&A bid was not due to opposition from the government-friendly board members, said financial regulators as well as the management.
One of the three directors under suspicion was found to have voted for the ING Life Korea acquisition bid. Another was appointed to the post after the group gave up on its M&A bid.
Hosting two extraordinary board meetings on Monday and Wednesday, chairman Euh grappled to placate the angry directors, stressing that the management had delivered its position to foreign investors that the information was baseless.
Meanwhile, the Financial Supervisory Service is investigating whether or not Euh was also involved in spreading the false information.
By Kim Yon-se (
kys@heraldcorp.com)