Poulssen/iStock Editorial via Getty Images Aegon ( AEG ) has reached a comprehensive agreement with its largest shareholder, Vereniging Aegon, on a new corporate governance framework designed to support the company’s planned relocation to the United States. The agreement aims to fully align Aegon’s governance with U.S. capital market standards as the insurer pursues its ambition to become a leadin...
Poulssen/iStock Editorial via Getty Images Aegon ( AEG ) has reached a comprehensive agreement with its largest shareholder, Vereniging Aegon, on a new corporate governance framework designed to support the company’s planned relocation to the United States. The agreement aims to fully align Aegon’s governance with U.S. capital market standards as the insurer pursues its ambition to become a leading U.S. life insurance and retirement group. To facilitate the corporate redomiciliation, Aegon plans to move its legal seat to Delaware and amend its bye-laws. Key proposed corporate updates include a phased removal of the staggered board structure with annual director elections beginning in 2030, the implementation of majority voting in uncontested elections, and annual "Say-on-Pay" advisory votes. Furthermore, Aegon will simplify its capital structure by converting all outstanding common shares B held by Vereniging Aegon on a 1:40 basis into a single class of common stock with equal voting rights, while authorizing a new class of preferred stock. As part of the restructuring, Vereniging Aegon will be renamed Vereniging Aegon Americas while retaining its current 18.4% pro-forma ownership stake, which will fully align with its voting rights going forward. Concurrently, the association's charitable and societal operations in the Netherlands will be transferred to a new, dedicated organization named Stichting Aegon Fonds Nederland. Vereniging Aegon will donate €500 million to this new Dutch foundation to support and expand its ongoing community and charitable initiatives. More on Aegon Ltd. Aegon: A Hidden U.S. Financial Services Re-Rating Opportunity Aegon prices $500M senior notes at 5.625% coupon Aegon to sell UK unit to Standard Life for £2B deal Seeking Alpha’s Quant Rating on Aegon Ltd. Historical earnings data for Aegon Ltd.
Yinson Holdings Bhd. ’s founding Lim family and Stonepeak Partners are considering withdrawing a plan to take the energy infrastructure company private, according to people familiar with the information. A decision could be made soon, the people said, asking not to be identified because the matter is private. The group had been building toward an 8 billion ringgit ($2 billion) offer for Kuala Lump...
Yinson Holdings Bhd. ’s founding Lim family and Stonepeak Partners are considering withdrawing a plan to take the energy infrastructure company private, according to people familiar with the information. A decision could be made soon, the people said, asking not to be identified because the matter is private. The group had been building toward an 8 billion ringgit ($2 billion) offer for Kuala Lumpur-listed Yinson for about a year. Yinson’s net income in the latest quarter plunged 65% from a year earlier to 228 million ringgit and revenue fell 19%. The company cited higher administrative expenses, impairment losses for renewables and green technologies and the absence of previous one-off gains from disposals. Founder Lim Han Weng said Yinson Production remains the group’s primary growth engine, with steady progress on projects under construction, including in Vietnam. The Lim family may still pursue a transaction with firms other than Stonepeak, some of the people said, adding that no final decision has been made. Representatives for Stonepeak, the Lim family and Yinson declined to comment. Bloomberg News reported last year that New York-based Stonepeak was teaming up with the Lim family, which established Yinson in the 1980s, for a buyout. Some local pension funds with shareholdings in Yinson were also part of the group, which was seeking to do the buyout via a scheme of arrangement. The Lim family owned 27.7% of Yinson at the end of April, the company’s website shows . After starting out as a transport and logistics firm, Yinson diversified into energy infrastructure, renewables and technology.
JD.com Inc. founder Liu Qiangdong vowed to prevent the e-commerce firm’s 900,000-strong workforce from losing their jobs to automation, seeking to allay growing fears that the adoption of AI and robotics could replace workers. The company, which is one of the country’s largest employers by headcount, will “do everything possible to safeguard employment for hundreds of thousands of staff, including...
JD.com Inc. founder Liu Qiangdong vowed to prevent the e-commerce firm’s 900,000-strong workforce from losing their jobs to automation, seeking to allay growing fears that the adoption of AI and robotics could replace workers. The company, which is one of the country’s largest employers by headcount, will “do everything possible to safeguard employment for hundreds of thousands of staff, including blue-collar workers,” Liu said in an internal speech on Wednesday, according to a video circulating on social media. “JD.com will not fire a single front-line worker replaced by machines,” he said. JD didn’t respond to an emailed request for comment. Chinese companies are racing to implement AI systems as part of a state-directed push to dominate the new technology. But those orders present a challenge to Chinese Communist Party planners who want to maintain stability in the labor market as the country reckons with a slowing economy and elevated youth unemployment . JD, which employs staff from couriers and store clerks to AI trainers and robot maintenance engineers, is experimenting with a host of unmanned technologies. According to a recent filing , those include “unmanned warehouses, drone delivery, self-driving vehicles, unmanned delivery stations and convenience stores, among others.” The online retailer has also set up more than 80 training bases around the country, saying they will serve to retrain workers with skills such as maintenance and servicing of automated systems, Liu said. Liu’s comments come after a Chinese court ruled in late April that companies cannot terminate employees or cut their salaries just to replace them with artificial intelligence systems. Chinese authorities also ruled last year that companies are legally required to retrain or reassign workers before they can be terminated — an early guardrail against AI job replacement few other countries have established. Read More: Xi’s AI Ambitions Collide With China’s Fragile Employment Market
Sending money abroad still means handing it off through a chain of banks, each one adding time and taking a cut. A transfer that should take seconds can take days, and the fees often aren’t clear to the sender or receiver until it’s done. Ripple introduced On-Demand Liquidity (ODL) to address this bottleneck by using ... What Is Ripple’s (XRP) On-Demand Liquidity Service?
Sending money abroad still means handing it off through a chain of banks, each one adding time and taking a cut. A transfer that should take seconds can take days, and the fees often aren’t clear to the sender or receiver until it’s done. Ripple introduced On-Demand Liquidity (ODL) to address this bottleneck by using ... What Is Ripple’s (XRP) On-Demand Liquidity Service?
SSE Plc said it is unlikely to meet its 2030 renewable energy target, citing a difficult market environment, policy uncertainty and delays to grid connections. The warning underscores the challenges facing the UK government’s goal of largely decarbonizing the power system by 2030 to cut emissions and lower bills, even as major utilities continue to invest billions of pounds in both renewables and ...
SSE Plc said it is unlikely to meet its 2030 renewable energy target, citing a difficult market environment, policy uncertainty and delays to grid connections. The warning underscores the challenges facing the UK government’s goal of largely decarbonizing the power system by 2030 to cut emissions and lower bills, even as major utilities continue to invest billions of pounds in both renewables and networks. The firm with the most green power capacity in the UK had planned to generate 50 terawatt-hours of renewable electricity annually by the end of the decade, a target it has called “ambitious.” However, in its Thursday earnings statement SSE said that target is now unlikely to be achieved, while also pointing to delays affecting some UK onshore wind projects. Grid capacity is emerging as one of the biggest obstacles to the energy transition. Significant investment is needed both to connect new wind farms and to expand the electricity network across the country. At the same time, local opposition to new infrastructure projects is creating further delays. For example, SSE said approval for its Cambushinnie substation in Scotland was withdrawn following a legal challenge and will now be reconsidered later this summer. The company also took a £155.8 million ($209 million) charge on two Scottish wind farms after delays connecting them to the electricity network pushed back construction timelines. Read More: Grid Connection Delays Threaten UK’s Offshore Wind Push In another setback for clean energy ambitions, SSE said it had paused its standalone hydrogen production projects because of delays to government support for the technology. The company said it will instead focus on hydrogen infrastructure in the Humber region and future hydrogen-to-power projects. The retreat from some renewable targets comes even as SSE continues to advance its offshore wind developments. Turbine installation at the 1.2-gigawatt Dogger Bank A offshore wind farm was completed earlier this year, ...