BIZ NUGGETS featuring Boeing investors, Exxon’s board, OpenAI vs. ScarJo, “superalignment”, and a “pointless director” list

Live from ISS’s “What Exactly Do We Do Here?” meeting room on the 14th floor of a 12-story building, it’s an all-new terrific Tuesday edition of Business Pants. Joined by Analyst-Hole Matt Moscardi! In today’s Jamie Dimon-bedazzled sun visor called May 21, 2024: Biz Nuggets and the Top 5 List Throwdown

Our show today is being sponsored by Free Float Analytics, the only platform measuring board power, connections, and performance for FREE. If you are curious if your directors actually generate shareholder returns and how big the gender power gap is, go to freefloatanalytics.com and sign up.

DAMION1​​ 

Nuggets

1. In our 'Boeing investors also approve eating rusty nails for breakfast, sleeping in boiling spaghetti water, and replacing the sun with a piece of extra crispy fried chicken' headline of the week. Boeing investors approve CEO's pay as company faces probes, possible prosecution 

1. In our 'Overheard frequently was the question, "What about your dentist? Do you like your dentist?"' headline of the week. New Boeing chair sought feedback for CEO search from customers, employees, investors

1. In our 'Yale professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld called Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun 'extra-double-mega-super-duper-double-donut-laser focused in finding the right person to replace him at a job that he wasn't entirely sure how to do in the first place'' headline of the week. Boeing re-elects outgoing CEO as search for replacement continues amid safety culture crisis

1. In our 'The fire was set as part of a controlled CEO celebration in response to extraordinary sycophantic investors' headline of the week. Boeing 747-400 catches fire, forced to land on flight from Indonesia to Saudi Arabia 

1. In our 'ISS to vote against expired half of a carton of expired milk for company-wide luncheon' headline of the week. CalPERS to vote against all 12 Exxon directors, citing lawsuit

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1. In our 'Hey, did anyone notice this guy is his BROTHER?  And this OTHER guy went to their WEDDINGS??  How come this wasn't in my ISS proxy report??!!' headline of the week. Tesla shareholders say Elon's influence makes Kimbal Musk and James Murdoch unsuitable for the company's board

1. In our 'We are innovating on an air vacuum cleaner that has taken 14 years to develop and currently sucks the equivalent of seventeen Coke bottles worth of CO2 out of the atmosphere, said Darren Woods, Exxon's CEO, in touting Exxon's incredible progress on carbon capture.  Bison, meanwhile, reportedly scoffed and suggested a vote against the Exxon board.' headline of the week. 170-strong bison herd can store CO2 emissions equivalent to 43K US cars: Climate crisis study - Deccan Herald

1. In our 'CalPERS, in a statement, claimed to be "pro Bison"' headline of the week. CalPERS to vote against Exxon board members

1. In our 'A Governance Riddle: If the CEO is an employee of the company, but the company is owned by a different company, and the board is chosen by the different company, and the CEO is held accountable by the board, then does a tree falling in the forest make a sound?' headline of the week. Red Lobster is blaming its bankruptcy on top shareholder and its ex-CEO, saying an $11m all-you-can-eat shrimp fiasco contributed to its demise

1. In our 'What if we did, like, all-you can-eat breakfast... like an ENDLESS breakfast.  A cheap breakfast that doesn't end.  Mr. Peltz, what do you think?' headline of the week. Wendy's will offer $3 breakfast deal, as rivals such as McDonald's test value meals to drive sales

DAMION2

1. In our 'Bill Ackman calls out leadership team at Neuralink whose only woman is the mother of Elon Musk's twins. Oh wait, this is an April Fool's Joke that ended up in the wrong folder. Please disregard.' headline of the week. Neuralink to implant 2nd human with brain chip as 85% of threads retract in 1st

1. In our 'Governor Meatball Ron DeSantis introduces bill to ban mammals from Florida' headline of the week. 170-strong bison herd can store CO2 emissions equivalent to 43K US cars: Climate crisis study 

1. In our 'OpenAI leaders also said they'll 'keep elevating' the coffee program for employees after spraying toxic rat poison in the coffee supply ' headline of the week. OpenAI's leaders say they'll 'keep elevating' safety after disbanding their existential dangers team

1. In our 'What did you say? Who?? Oh, Kimbal. Nah. Don’t worry about him. Just the CEO's brother. He’s fine. You won't even notice him. And look, it’s too late now: There is a statute of limitations at the SEC which curtails terrible shareholders. It says ‘if you can't manage to vote out a sucky director after 10 years then you are stuck with said sucky director for life.’ Kimbal has been on the Tesla board since 2004. He’s yours now. Sorry.' headline of the week. Tesla shareholders say Elon's influence makes Kimbal Musk and James Murdoch unsuitable for the company's board

1. In our 'Oh you mean that shitty restaurant owned by private equity firm Golden Gate Capital? Where only 5 of 44 members of the Investment Team are women? The same Golden Gate Capital where 9 of 10 members of the Administrative team are women. Yeah, this is 2024, we don't take private equity firm patriarchies like Golden Gate Capital seriously anymore. And you shouldn't either. All you can eat shrimp? Yeah, that's what boys in middle school dream up. ' headline of the week. Red Lobster is blaming its bankruptcy on top shareholder and its ex-CEO, saying an $11m all-you-can-eat shrimp fiasco contributed to its demise

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1. In our 'First agenda item today, I'm going to need someone to call Douglas Rain, he was the voice of HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey, I'd like him for the next version of our chatbot.  Wait, he DIED?  Hmmm... Does anyone else have any really recognizable actor voices that played horrible machines?  James Spader?  Rutger Hauer?  Is Skynet a real thing does anyone know?  We need a good voice...' headline of the week. Scarlett Johansson Said No, but OpenAI’s Virtual Assistant Sounds Just Like Her

1. In our 'These ASSHOLES stole what we rightfully stole first.  THIS IS INJUSTICE.' headline of the week. Sundar Pichai says OpenAI might have breached YouTube's terms and conditions to train its text-to-video model Sora

1. In our 'We are now announcing we're are downgrading our "superalignment" team, which had planned to be super aligned to humanity, to a "slightly angled" team, which plans on being at a 36% angle to humanity for the foreseeable future.' headline of the week. OpenAI just dissolved its team dedicated to managing AI risks, like the possibility of it 'going rogue'

1. In our 'Also in the works, a billionaire silencer' headline of the week. A group of college kids may have just figured out how to get leaf blowers to shut up

Data List Throwdown

DAMION3

• I looked at companies with the most pointless directors.

• I looked at the 1500 largest US companies.

• The overall winner is financial services company CME Group with 7 pointless directors, which represents nearly a third of the board (n=23)

• But my favorite is aptly named Extra Space Storage (you can’t make this shit up) where 31% of the board (4 directors) are Extra Space Storage: I’m looking at you Mark, Sue, Joe, and Jeff!

1. And before you ask, the answer is NO, this is not a dual class company with crazy voting rights and this is not a dictatorship controlled company where one person holds all the power. This is just a company with some Extra Space Storage, in human form

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Top Five Industries with Engineering Knowledge on the Board

• Find which industries have, on average, the highest level of engineering influence on their boards

5. Environmental & Facilities Services

• Average Engineering Knowledge influence: 1.6%

• Example companies: Casella Waste (Doug Casella), Clean Harbors (Alan McKim)

4. Commercial Printing

• Average Engineering Knowledge influence: 1.6%

• Example companies: Toppan (Hideharu Maro), Raksul (Yasukane Matsumoto), Ennis (Keith Walters)

3. Security & Alarm Services

• Average Engineering Knowledge influence: 1.6%

• Example companies: Brink’s Company (Michael Herling, Mark Eubanks), SECOM (Ichiro Ozeki), Loomis AB (Alf Goransson)

2. Human Resource & Employment Services

• Average Engineering Knowledge influence: 1.7%

• Example companies: Insperity (Paul Sarvadi), BTS (Henrik Ekelund), S-Pool (Sohei Urakami)

1. Biotechnology

• Average Engineering Knowledge influence: 1.8%

• Example companies: Galapagos NV (Paul Stoffels), Natera (Matthew Rabinowitz), Zai Lab (Samantha Du)