Nelson Peltz won’t be joining Procter and Gamble’s board any time soon.
Just one week after a preliminary count by an independent auditor showed that the billionaire activist investor behind Trian Partners won a board seat by a razor-thin margin, the consumer packaged goods giant reiterated that it wanted to wait for a final tally before welcoming the hedgie aboard.
“As we said before, the IVS tabulation results are preliminary and are going through the customary review to ensure a final and accurate count,” P&G said in a statement Wednesday.
A count by independent auditor IVS, released last week, showed that Peltz won by 42,780 shares — or, 0.002 percent of the vote.
IVS’ count came one month after P&G already declared victory in keeping Peltz off of the board, following the company’s October general meeting. P&G said the company’s incumbent director Ernesto Zedillo beat Peltz by 6 million shares — already a slim margin for a company that has more than 2 billion shares.
In the first count, P&G only had access to count their own votes and Trian could only count its votes and report the figure to P&G. IVS, meanwhile, has access to all of the votes and works to ensure that a shareholder’s most recent vote is the one that is counted and it discards the other ones.
“P&G will disclose the results after receiving the Independent Inspector of Elections’ final certified report, which we are pushing to get as quickly as possible,” P&G said.
Trian was furious with P&G’s decision, blasting that the Pampers’-maker for deciding to waste time and “squander” shareholder money on the recount.
“Regardless of how they voted, P&G shareholders should be concerned that P&G has opted to waste further time and shareholder money contesting the official tabulation of the independent Inspector,” Trian said Wednesday, putting the estimate of P&G’s spending above $100 million.
“The review and challenge process will be a continued distraction at a time when management and the Board should be focused on improving business results and regaining lost market share,” Trian said.
P&G votes dipped 0.5 percent to $88.24 Wednesday morning as news of the challenge emerged.
In challenging the votes — or waiting for the so-called “final” vote –P&G and Trian are said to be entering the “snake pit.” The term refers both to viciousness of both sides monitoring the auditor’s process as well as the tangled and confusing nature of verifying votes.
IVS’ “results are not yet certified and the review is somewhat like the Bush v Gore review and challenge of votes in Florida in 2000,” Bruce Goldfarb, of proxy advisory firm Okapi Partners told The Post last week.
Peltz has been publicly angling to get on P&G’s board since July, claiming that the company’s “insular” culture has weakened its returns. His $17 billion hedge fund has a $3.5 billion stake in P&G.
