Disney Showdown: Woke Bob Iger Facing Off with Nelson Peltz at Shareholders Meeting
Allen Berezovsky; David A. Grogan/CNBC/NBCU/Getty Images
The lead-up to the Walt Disney Company's annual shareholders meeting on Wednesday is offering more hype and genuine drama than any of the studio's woke movies that have bombed at the box office.
Which way, Mouse House?
CEO Bob Iger is looking to maintain a firm grip on the Disney board. But is support slipping away? His left-wing pandering has resulted in a recent string of box-office disasters that is unprecedented in company history. He has waged a costly and ill-advised cultural war against the state of Florida — a fight that Disney recently lost.
And he has yet to make good on the promise that his return would spark Disney's own return to its former glory, with Disney shares underperforming in recent years.
Then there's billionaire investor Nelson Peltz, who is engaged in a battle with Iger over the direction of the company.
Peltz believes Disney has lost its way and is looking to secure board seats. Specifically, he is looking to score two seats, having nominated himself and former Disney CFO Jay Rasulo. He is aiming to replace two Iger loyalists: Maria Elena Lagomasino and former Mastercard executive Michael Froman.
Peltz's Trian Fund Management owns $3 billion of Disney common stock — or, a little less than 2 percent of the company. The majority of Trian's Disney shares are owned by former Marvel Entertainment chair Ike Perlmutter — a key Trump ally who is backing Peltz's boardroom offensive.
And he has gained crucial support from key institutional investors and other major players — Egan-Jones, Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS), and the California state pension fund CalPERS.
Egan-Jones, a credit ratings company, has been publicly critical of Disney's entrance into what it called “the killing fields of the culture wars” — a reference to Disney's battle with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) over the teaching of radical LGBTQ ideology in public schools.
Disney lost that battle last month when it withdrew its lawsuit against Florida following a costly battle that saw the company lose its self-governing privileges in the Orlando area — a valuable perk Disney had enjoyed for five decades.
Disney has also aggressively pushed transgender ideology in its entertainment for children by creating trans and gender non-conforming characters.
This week, BlackRock and T. Rowe Price said they would back Iger, seemingly giving him the advantage over Peltz, according to a Wall Street Journal report. Iger has already secured support from Star Wars filmmaker George Lucas, Disney’s largest individual shareholder.
The down-to-the-wire battle has put Disney on edge. The company has put out commercials reminding shareholders to cast their vote before the deadline.
Disney's shareholder meeting is set to take place Wednesday at 1 p.m. ET and will be streamed live.
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