Blucora shareholders rejected four dissident board of director candidates from investor Ancora Holdings this week. The company, which owns Avantax Wealth Management and TaxAct, said its 10 current member were re-elected by a wide margin although final vote totals were not immediately available.One position taken by Ancora was that TaxAct has no relationship to the other company offerings and should be sold.
The campaign had gotten personal when Blucora quoted anti-trust expert William J. Baert that the election of Ancora CEO Fred DiSanto would be a violation of the Clayton Antitrust Act, which prohibits rivals from sitting on a competitor’s board. Ancora responded by calling the Blucora charges a “low road” effort
Blucora had also charged that DiSanto had a demonstrated inability to follow laws and the compliance policies of his own organization.
Ancora said on April 12 it had learned “Blucora has been privately slinging mud at our nominees in hopes of accusations becoming public.” It denied being a direct competitor, saying it served “very different products to a much different clientele through different marketing channels” and had filed suit in Delaware asking a court to declare it is not a competitor.
The election drew different positions from proxy advisory firms. Institutional Shareholder Services, which said shareholders should vote for DiSanto and his team. Rival advisory firm Glass, Lewis, recommended electing company-backed diretors.
