ISS Recommends Stockholders Support Meaningful Change at Enhabit by Voting the WHITE Proxy Card “FOR” Three of AREX Capital’s Nominees
12 Luglio 2024 - 3:00PM
Business Wire
ISS Concludes Support Is Warranted for AREX
Nominees to Add Beneficial Industry-Specific Expertise and
“Oversight Over the Company's Financial Reporting and Shareholder
Communications”
ISS Recognizes “The Most Apparent Needs for
the Board Are Additional Expertise Related to Home Health, Hospice,
and Public Company Financial Reporting”
AREX Urges Stockholders to Elect Its Full
Slate to Ensure Enhabit Has a Board with the Necessary
Industry-Specific Experience to Oversee and Guide
Management
AREX Capital Management, LP (together with its affiliates,
“AREX”), the beneficial owner of approximately 4.9% of the
outstanding common shares of Enhabit, Inc. (NYSE: EHAB) (“Enhabit”
or the “Company”), today announced that Institutional Shareholder
Services Inc. (“ISS”), a leading independent proxy advisory firm,
has recommended that Enhabit’s stockholders support meaningful
boardroom change by voting for three of its director candidates at
the Company’s 2024 Annual Meeting of Stockholders (the “Annual
Meeting”) on July 25, 2024. ISS recommends that stockholders elect
Anna-Gene O’Neal, Mark W. Ohlendorf, and Dr. Gregory S. Sheff to
Enhabit’s Board of Directors (the “Board”).
AREX Managing Partner, Andrew Rechtschaffen, and James T.
Corcoran, AREX Partner, commented:
“We are pleased that a leading independent proxy advisory firm
has recognized the lack of home health and hospice industry
expertise on Enhabit’s Board and validated our case for meaningful
boardroom change by recommending that stockholders vote for
Anna-Gene O’Neal, Mark W. Ohlendorf, and Dr. Gregory S. Sheff at
the upcoming Annual Meeting. We also appreciate that ISS has
acknowledged that stockholders may wish to add a direct stockholder
voice to the Board by voting for James T. Corcoran.
Electing the full AREX Slate would also bring highly beneficial
industry-specific human capital management, operational
optimization, and payor contracting expertise to the Board. After
two years of significant financial and operational
underperformance, we firmly believe the election of all seven of
our nominees is the best way to support Enhabit’s realization of
its full potential and the creation of value for all
stockholders.”
In its report, ISS made the following observations regarding the
need for boardroom change at Enhabit:1
- “The most apparent needs for the board include experience in
home health and hospice, as well as additional financial expertise
given the company's issues with financial reporting and investor
communications. On balance, we find that the addition of three
dissident nominees would allow for a strong contingent of new
candidates with an outside perspective…”
- “…[T]he election of three dissident nominees would provide
additional expertise in each of the company's businesses and
additional oversight over the company's financial reporting and
shareholder communications.”
- “…[B]oth Sheff and O'Neal expressed a nuanced and detailed
understanding of the home health and hospice markets, respectively,
as well as the specific challenges facing EHAB in each business.
Dissident nominee Ohlendorf has significant public company CFO
experience, having served as CFO at BKD … he appears to have the
necessary skills and experience of communicating with shareholders
of a substantially larger public company.”
- “Given the need for change at the board level, it is reasonable
that some shareholders may be supportive of adding a direct
shareholder to the board, in Corcoran.”
ISS also detailed Enhabit’s poor financial and operational
performance as well as its leadership’s overall lack of
effectiveness:
- “There is no question of EHAB's underperformance since the
spin-off. EHAB's TSR has significantly underperformed its peers and
the broader market since the spin-off…”
- “The company’s operational performance has seen a significant
erosion in profitability, with adjusted EBITDA falling by more than
40 percent over the five quarters following the spin-off. Further,
the company has shown a persistent inability to provide accurate
guidance to the market … These factors substantiate the dissident's
critique of the company's financial reporting and investor
communications, and raise questions as to whether a change is
needed in the CFO position…”
- “…[T]he addition of CFO-level experience at the board level
could improve board oversight of these concerns, particularly given
that none of the named executive officers (NEOs) of EHAB had prior
outside public company c-suite experience at the spin-off.”
- “…[T]he company’s TSR and operational performance raise
questions as to how effectively [the legacy Encompass directors]
performed their duties.”
***
AREX encourages stockholders to vote for all seven of its highly qualified nominees on the
WHITE Proxy Card at the
upcoming 2024 Annual Meeting. AREX believes this is the only way to
ensure that Enhabit has a Board with the right experience and
skills to effectively oversee management and help them drive
operational improvements that can lead to significant value
creation for stockholders.
Stockholders are encouraged to visit www.rehabEHAB.com for
additional information and to download AREX’s comprehensive plan to
turn around Enhabit’s operational performance: Rehabilitate
Enhabit.
About AREX
AREX Capital Management, LP is a value-oriented investment firm
based in New York City. AREX takes a long-term, opportunistic
approach to investing and focuses primarily on publicly traded
companies with significant, unrealized potential.
_______________________________ 1 Permission to use quotations
from ISS was neither sought nor obtained.
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version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240712370803/en/
Investor Contact Saratoga Proxy Consulting John Ferguson
(212) 257-1311 rehabEHAB@saratogaproxy.com Media Contact
Longacre Square Partners Charlotte Kiaie / Bela Kirpalani (646)
386-0091 rehabEHAB@longacresquare.com
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