Dan Loeb Triumphs Against Sotheby’s, Dow Chemical

Dan Loeb, Third Point (Dan Loeb, CEO of Third Point)Hedge fund manager and activist investor Dan Loeb found himself victor in two yearlong campaigns against Sotheby’s and Dow Chemical this week.

The auction house announced on Thursday that Chairman, President, and CEO William Ruprecht will “step down by mutual agreement with the board.”

His resignation ends a drawn-out proxy battle with Third Point’s Loeb, who is also Sotheby’s largest shareholder. In a harshly worded letter to Ruprecht last year, Loeb said the CEO “[has] not shown the innovation or inspiration the company sorely needs to play offense today.”

“Sotheby’s is like an old master painting in desperate need of restoration,” he wrote, asking for Ruprecht’s resignation.

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The company said it has already formed a search committee for a new CEO. It has also retained executive search firm Spencer Stuart to help with the process.

“We are moving with a sense of urgency but we will take the time we need to find the right leader for Sotheby’s at this critical juncture in its continuing evolution,” said Domenico De Sole, the auction house’s lead independent director.

Ruprecht, 58, said he would continue working until a successor is chosen. He had joined the company more than 30 years ago and has led Sotheby’s as CEO since 2000.

“I am comfortable and confident saying Sotheby’s is well positioned for the next chapter of its success, and I will do all I can to contribute to a smooth leadership transition,” he said.

Dow Chemical also announced on Friday it had “arrived at an agreeable path forward” with Third Point and Loeb by adding four new independent directors to its board.

While the chemical giant accepted two of Loeb’s suggestions for new board members—Raymond Milchovich, former CEO of engineering conglomerate Foster Wheeler, and Steve Miller, the chairman of American International Group—it said all directors will work collaboratively.

“In any public company, directors have responsibility for making decisions about the future of the company on the basis of a collective majority, and that is how our board will continue to function going forward,” Dow Chemical said in a statement.

Last week, the activist investor stepped up the pressure on Dow Chemical by launching a website attacking its financial performance and CEO Andrew Liveris. The website has been taken down since the agreement has been made.

Third Point has also agreed to a one-year standstill agreement that prohibits the firm from publically criticizing Dow Chemical.

New York City’s Bureau of Asset Management—investor to its $160 billion of pension money—has named internal staffers to lead its private equity and hedge fund programs.

Effective immediately, NYC’s comptroller appointed Alex Doñé as head of private equity and Neil Messing to take over the hedge fund portfolio.

Doñé has worked at the bureau, investing the city’s five pension funds, since 2012. Prior to the promotion, he served as the fund’s executive director of private equity and oversaw its $5.6 billion emerging managers program.

He spent the bulk of his earlier career in the private sector, with 16 years of experience in investment banking and private equity. Doñé has worked at Clearlake Capital Group, KPMG Corporate Finance, and Merrill Lynch. For two years, he served as a presidential appointee at the US Department of Commerce’s Minority Business Development Agency.

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The NYC pensions’ new head of hedge funds likewise built his background in the private sector before becoming an asset owner in 2011. Messing most recently served as the fund’s senior investment officer responsible for hedge funds. According to the NYC comptroller’s office, he “built and managed a diversified $4 billion portfolio of direct hedge fund investments and a fund-of-hedge funds” for the pensions.

“The appointment of Alex and Neil will strengthen the investment operations of the Bureau of Asset Management,” said Scott Evans, CIO of the New York City Pension Funds. “Alex and Neil are ethical and sophisticated investment managers and I am excited to see them take on new roles as part of senior leadership.”

Evans himself is fairly new on the job. With the January 1, 2014 turnover of the city’s administration, much of the internal pension investment staff changed as well. In May, then-newly elected Comptroller Scott Stringer appointed Evans as CIO—a title he previously held at TIAA-CREF’s retirement services division.