"Local Corporates Need To Buck Up on Corporate Governance"

I wrote before about James Hay from the Pangolin Fund.

Another interesting interview with BFM can be found here.

00:46 about research on pangolins needing funds
01:45 bonds versus equities
04:50 corporate governance, strong correlation between good CG and returns
05:15 many listed companies are family controlled
05:40 the need to visit companies and meet management
06:10 many companies, especially in Malaysia, still destroy value, diluting shareholders
07:20 lack of shareholder activism, very few fund managers go to AGMs and question management and INEDs
08:20 need to look in past history, company announcements
09:40 short term "adventures" by management in unrelated industries destroys value
10:10 companies should give excess cash back to shareholders, not waste it in risky investments
12:55 Hay also got "fooled", like in Silverbird's case
14:00 concentrated investing, intention to hold the shares for the long term
15:30 Challenger, Singapore listed
16:50 12% performance per year, calculated in USD

Why are so few local fund managers speaking out about bad CG?

It seems they "outsource" that work to MSWG, which is of course the "easy" solution, but not enough.