Southwest Airlines and its activist hedge fund foe might become friends
Southwest Airlines (LUV) and the activist hedge fund that has been trying to wrest control from the carrier’s management team might be about to reach an agreement to end their continuing proxy battle. Bloomberg reports that the parties are negotiating a settlement that would have Southwest cede a number of seats on its board to Elliott Investment Management.
Neither Southwest nor Elliott immediately responded to a request for comment.
In June, Elliott announced it had acquired an 11% stake in Southwest with aims to steer the company to success after a period of dismal business. Its plans were to nominate a slate of directors, remove CEO Bob Jordan, and instigate a “comprehensive business review” to help turn things around.
Some analysts were not quite impressed with Elliott’s plan. Jordan said he would not be leaving and has pushed a new plan forward that would see Southwest abandon its long-standing open-seating policy and pivot to more traditional carrier behavior.
Elliott has maintained that such moves are too little, too late. Until further notice, it is pushing for a special shareholder meeting where it will ask its fellow investors to back its plans. Last week, it even announced a podcast where it would interview its director slate one by one.
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