Apple fights Einhorn’s bid to block vote granting shareholders right to approve preferred shares

“Apple Inc. said it will fight Greenlight Capital Inc.’s bid to bar the company from adopting a measure restricting its ability to issue preferred stock,” Christie Smythe and Adam Satariano report for Bloomberg. “The maker of iPhones and MacBooks filed a response yesterday in U.S. District Court in New York to the request made by Greenlight in its lawsuit.”

“‘The proposed injunction would harm the public interest,’ and should be denied, Apple said in the filing. The measure ‘gives common shareholders greater power — the right to approve issuance of preferred shares,’ Apple said,” Smythe and Satariano report. “The hedge fund claimed Cupertino, California-based Apple unfairly grouped the preferred share measure with other matters to be voted on at a meeting Feb. 27, violating the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ‘unbundling rules.'”

Smythe and Satariano report, “Apple said in its filing that it’s not violating SEC rules and that the move only eliminates so-called “blank check” preferred stock provisions. Without the provisions, preferred shares could still be offered as long as investors approve the change, according to Apple… U.S. District Judge Richard Sullivan set a Feb. 22 hearing to consider Greenlight’s request to block the vote.”

Read more in the full article here.

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