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Troubled banknote printer De La Rue faces new campaign to oust chairman
Crystal Amber Funds has requisitioned an EGM to seek the removal of Kevin Loosemore as the underperforming company’s chairman, Sky News learns.
Thursday 30 March 2023 19:34, UK
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FILE PHOTO: Wads of British Pound Sterling banknotes are stacked in piles at the Money Service Austria company's headquarters in Vienna, Austria, November 16, 2017. REUTERS/Leonhard Foeger/File Photo
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The chairman of De La Rue, the struggling London-listed banknote printer, is facing a third vote on his tenure in less than a year after a major investor renewed its efforts to unseat him.
Sky News has learnt that Crystal Amber Funds, which owns nearly 10% of De La Rue’s shares, has requisitioned an extraordinary general meeting seeking the removal of Kevin Loosemore.
Crystal Amber has told the company that it wants Pepijn Dinandt, an experienced industrials sector executive, to be appointed in his place.
Shareholders will be asked to vote on both resolutions at a forthcoming meeting.
City sources said a stock exchange announcement confirming the EGM requisition notice was likely to be made on Friday.
It follows a protracted period of unrest from shareholders led by Crystal Amber about De La Rue’s performance.
The company, whose customers include the Bank of England, has seen its shares continue to fare appallingly, with a further slump of over 50% in the last 12 months.
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De La Rue now has a market value of just £109m, despite having raised £100m from a share sale in July 2020.
It has been hit by a string of profit warnings triggered by management mishaps.
In a statement issued on Thursday evening, Richard Bernstein, Crystal Amber founder and investment adviser, said: “It is time for the chairman to take responsibility for the destruction of shareholder value on his watch.
“There have been strategic blunders and we urgently require new strategic leadership.”
Mr Loosemore, who became chairman of De La Rue in 2019, sailed through a vote on his re-election at last year’s annual meeting.
At a further vote instigated by the company in December, he was backed by 83% of shareholders.
Earlier this month, Sky News revealed that De La Rue had requested breathing space from its pension trustees by delaying nearly £20m of retirement funding payments.
Last November, it issued the latest in a series of profit alerts and criticised its auditor, EY, for including a going concern warning in its accounts.
Since then it has disclosed further challenges involving its operations in India and Kenya, further hitting its depressed share price.
A spokesman for De La Rue declined to comment.
