Should Shareholders Have Been Able to Replace the Bear Stearns Directors?

(NewsVisual, powered by IntellectSpace) -- Although the speed with which it met its demise might have come as a shock to just about everyone in the worldwide financial community, there was a fight underway by disgruntled shareholders to replace several members of The Bear Stearns Companies Inc (NYSE:BSC) Board of Directors earlier last year.

“Bear Stearns may be particularly vulnerable due to its heavy exposure to the subprime crisis, which may help sway the courts about the need for shareholders to have a direct voice in choosing directors,” according to a March 13 BusinessWeek article that reported on the Security and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Nov 2006 decision to limit shareholders access to proxy ballots, which effectively curtailed their ability to vote on the removal or installation of the firm's Directors.

This weekend’s demise of Bear Stearns did not end the debate over who should have a right to elect the Directors of companies.

In an article posted on BloggingStocks.com on Tuesday, Zac Bissonnette angrily denounced the SEC’s decision for preventing the shareholders of Bear Stearns from being able to redress its "horrifically bad management and governance.

NewsVisual decided to create an IntellectSpace Knowledge Map of Bear Stearns Board of Directors in order to illustrate its members’ past and current connections to other corporate entities.

The question of whether their service on other boards will come in for more scrutiny remains a question to be answered in the coming days.

To see the details of these Directors other board-room connections, click here for an interactive and fuller version of this IntellectSpace Knowledge Map.

(Note: the information contained and presented in Knowledge Maps is public information from the Securities and Exchange Commission of the United States of America).