By Ross Kerber Tue May 22, 2012 3:31pm EDT (Reuters) - Some of Facebook Inc's good friends have suffered in its rocky initial public offering. Firsthand Technology Value Fund and GSV Capital Corp, two closed-end funds that bought shares of the social media company before its IPO, have been pummeled, used as proxies for betting against Facebook."Until investors can actually short Facebook, they have to keep shorting things that can give them some sort of proxy for Facebook," said Thomas Vandeventer, manager of the Tocqueville Opportunity Fund, which owns shares in both closed-end funds.Firsthand is down 26 percent in the three trading days since Facebook went public. GSV has lost 27 percent. Managers of both funds were not immediately available for comment.So soon after Facebook's ... Continue reading →

Mon May 21, 2012 4:55pm EDT * Fidelity, T. Rowe Price funds bought on secondary market * Fidelity paid $25 to $35 per share -analyst estimate* Funds could have bought more shares on Monday* Pax World CIO: Early fund purchases cut IPO demandBy Ross KerberMay 21 (Reuters) - Fidelity Investments and other big mutual fund families that were early backers of Facebook Inc are likely still winners despite the social network's troubled stock market debut.Facebook shares were priced at $38 per share in its initial public offering on Thursday. Despite an initial bump in their market debut on Friday, the shares fell on Monday, closing down 11 percent at $34.03. The decline prompted much hand-wringing among technology investors who had expected a bigger boost for ... Continue reading →

Approximately 5,000 honeybees followed their queen onto Nickerson Field less than an hour before BU’s 139th Commencement exercises began. Photo by Tom Daley Roughly 5,000 unticketed guests swarmed onto Nickerson Field just 45 minutes before the scheduled start of BU’s 139th Commencement exercises, bringing with them the potential for minor havoc. Honeybees, following their queen to a new home just after noon on a sunny spring day, alighted on a plastic chair in a guest section of the field, just behind the area designated for graduates of the College of Communication. Grounds crew, who spotted the growing ball of insects clinging to the underside of a plastic seat, knew just the man to call: Bill Murray. No, not the Bill Murray of Ghostbusters fame, but ... Continue reading →

By Ross Kerber Sun May 20, 2012 4:18pm EDT May 20 (Reuters) - Google Inc Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt challenged college graduates on Sunday to take the radical step -- at least for their generation -- of tearing their eyes away from their smartphones and computer screens. "Take one hour a day and turn that thing off," Schmidt told graduates at Boston University, where he received an honorary degree and was applauded by an audience that had grown up relying on the technology company's search engine, e-mail and other services."Take your eyes off that screen and look into the eyes of the person you love. Have a conversation, a real conversation," Schmidt said.Schmidt's advice came midway through his remarks and provided context around his broader ... Continue reading →

By Ross Kerber Boston | Fri May 18, 2012 2:54pm EDT Boston (Reuters) - Welcome to the club, Jamie Dimon. Embarrassed by a surprise $2 billion trading loss last week, the chairman and chief executive of JPMorgan Chase & Co faced heightened criticism at the bank's annual meeting on Tuesday. That included 40 percent backing from shareholders for a resolution to strip Dimon of his chairmanship title, up from 34 percent in 2010.With the spring U.S. annual meeting season at its midpoint, investors have voted 36 percent of their shares on average in favor of measures urging companies to appoint board chairmen who are independent from management, up from 33 percent last year and 28 percent in 2010, according to proxy advisory firm ISS.More votes ... Continue reading →

Wed May 16, 2012 2:07pm EDT By Ross KerberMay 16 (Reuters) - Legg Mason Inc said it plans to buy back notes held by private equity firm KKR & Co LP and repurchase additional stock, driving its shares up 11 percent.KKR had purchased $1.25 billion in convertible senior notes in the Baltimore asset manager in 2008. Legg Mason said on Wednesday it will repurchase the senior notes and expects to take a noncash charge of between $70 million and $80 million in its fiscal first quarter due to the early retirement of the notes.Legg Mason also said its board of directors has authorized $1 billion for the additional repurchase of shares. In addition, KKR executive Scott Nuttall will step down from Legg Mason's board of ... Continue reading →

Tue May 15, 2012 5:31am EDT (Reuters) - Jamie Dimon faces growing calls to give up the chairmanship of JPMorgan Chase & Co when shareholders of the bank convene on Tuesday, days after it revealed losses of billions of dollars in trades that were supposed to protect it from risk. The meeting, at the bank's back-office complex in Tampa, Florida, will give investors their first crack at Dimon, also JPMorgan's chief executive, since he revealed a soured hedging strategy had cost at least $2 billion and possibly much more.The California Public Employees' Retirement System (CalPERS), the largest pension fund in the United States, will lead calls to strip Dimon of the chairmanship in a move it said would likely lead to better risk controls."CalPERS believes ... Continue reading →

By Ross Kerber BOSTON | Fri May 11, 2012 6:06pm EDT BOSTON (Reuters) - JPMorgan Chase & Co's surprise $2 billion trading loss will embolden critics of the bank at its annual meeting next week, where some shareholders will be pushing to split Jamie Dimon's dual role as chairman and chief executive. "Investors will be looking for a way to send a signal to management," said Adam Kanzer, general counsel at Domini Social Investments, a JPMorgan shareholder based in New York. "Calling for an independent chair is a direct attack on Dimon's authority as CEO."Major pension funds in New York, California and Florida as well as the two leading proxy advisory firms - ISS and Glass, Lewis - are already backing the nonbinding proposal calling ... Continue reading →

By Ross Kerber Fri May 11, 2012 2:53pm EDT (Reuters) - One of the earliest critics of Chesapeake Energy Corp is a 70-year-old Denver investor with no patience for e-mail. Armed instead with just a telephone and a fax machine, Gerald Armstrong pushed for corporate governance changes at the Oklahoma energy company long before the recent attention on the oversight of its founder and Chief Executive Officer, Aubrey McClendon.In 2008 and 2009, Armstrong convinced a majority of Chesapeake shareholders to back proposals for annual elections of directors, something he said would make them more accountable.After those votes, Oklahoma adopted a law that effectively undermined his victories. Now, Armstrong is at it again, asking company stockholders to approve in June a measure to reincorporate Chesapeake in ... Continue reading →

Tue May 1, 2012 11:15am EDT * Q4 EPS 54 cents vs. 45 cents year ago * Outflows narrow at Baltimore asset manager* CEO: Always a lag between performance gains and inflowsBy Ross KerberMay 1 (Reuters) - Legg Mason Inc's quarterly earnings rose 10 percent, the Baltimore asset manager said on Tuesday, as it finished a streamlining plan that cut expenses, but faced continued outflows of investor cash from its funds.The company's shares rose slightly on Tuesday after the results, but were down about 0.2 percent at late morning trading. The prices showed how Legg Mason's track record remains mixed as Chief Executive Mark Fetting tries to rejuvenate its results.In an interview, Fetting noted outflows have narrowed in recent quarters and that cost-cutting has positioned ... Continue reading →