News Digest for October 25, 2006

There are 8 items… NYSE Moves to Bar Some Broker Votes | Research managers agonise over buy ratings | What Are Directors Thinking? | First senior executive admits options fraud | Study finds options scandal has cost companies billions | Hedge Funds Charm Main Street, Though Few Understand Them | Print to Preview | IE7 Hits the Street

NYSE Moves to Bar Some Broker Votes
In a long-awaited overhaul of the way corporate boardmembers are selected, the New York Stock Exchange moved to bar Wall Street firms from casting votes on behalf of their customers unless those customers make their intentions known.

Research managers agonise over buy ratings
The head of research at one bank said last month he had given a team two weeks to cut its buy ratings from 50% to a more sensible level. Other firms are ordering researchers to reduce their proportion of buy ratings.

What Are Directors Thinking?
Board members are less concerned with the influence of hedge funds, than they are with institutional investors, and think they do a “very effective” job standing up to management, says a new survey.

First senior executive admits options fraud
David Kreinberg, the former chief financial officer of Comverse, the voicemail software company, on Tuesday became the first top executive to plead guilty to conspiracy and securities fraud in connection with options backdating.

Study finds options scandal has cost companies billions
A financial advisory firm has released an analysis estimating the stock-option backdating scandal has cost at least 152 companies nationwide about $10.3 billion.

Hedge Funds Charm Main Street, Though Few Understand Them
Morningstar, the mutual fund data and tracking organization, and Research magazine find in a new study that most advisers place their clients in hedge funds, even though they don’t particularly understand the structure. In fact, many advisers aren’t even sure if their clients are qualified to invest in them.

Print to Preview
Going from the browser to the printer has always been a bit of a guessing game. In this article, Pete McVicar shows us a method for providing users with a reliable print preview.

IE7 Hits the Street
Just in case you missed it somehow, we released IE7 last Wednesday. In the first four days over three million of you have already downloaded the final release.

Please Support Our Work
Email your friends about us. Subscribe to our paid publication Online IR Trends Quarterly. Get us to recommend improvements to your IR website (we're really good at it).