Activist targets
Less than a quarter of companies polled in our Global IR Survey 2019 have been targeted by an activist investor. Fewer than one in 10 companies have been targeted in the past year and 18 percent have experienced shareholder activism within the past four years.
Regionally, North American companies are the most likely to have been targeted by an activist investor, with 27 percent of companies from this region having been targeted in the past. But more than one in 10 North American companies last experienced an activist campaign more than four years ago; more recent activity is found in Europe and Asia, where 16 percent of companies have experienced activism in the past two years compared with 12 percent of North American companies.
More than a third of mega-cap companies have experienced shareholder activism. Although this means the largest companies are the ones most likely to be targeted, there has been a recent trend of activists targeting small-cap companies. While 11 percent of mega-cap companies last experienced an activist campaign more than four years ago, 15 percent of small-cap companies have been targeted by an activist investor in the past year.