Among the 38 companies targeted by activists in 2011, only 10 resulted in proxy fights.

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King, a company well-versed in proxy fights, according to a new SEC filing.

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Meanwhile, smaller companies are assiduously taking steps to avoid proxy fights if only because they can ill afford the cost.

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Three decades of scalps, resulting from some of the most famous hostile takeovers, proxy fights and board assaults in American financial history, cover every cranny of his wood-lined corridors.

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The companies disclosed the clawback policies separately in Securities and Exchange Commission filings in late January and early February, in connection with agreements they reached to end proxy fights waged by the office that runs New York City's pension funds.

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Georgeson's Goldfarb, who specializes in proxy fights, sees this as proof that institutional investors are becoming more involved in companies in which they sink money, and cites fights that occurred at Willamette Industries and Hewlett-Packard (nyse: HPQ - news - people ) as proof.

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Eritrea also fights a proxy war against Ethiopia in Somalia and in Ethiopia's rebellious Ogaden region.

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