Speakers at the Canadian Investor Relations Institute’s (Ciri) annual conference don’t usually need a police escort. It’s just that when Helen Beck, a portfolio manager at CN Investment Division, wanted to get to the historic Chateau Frontenac in Quebec City, so did thousands of hockey fans celebrating the Quebec Ramparts’ Memorial Cup victory. Luckily the police came to the rescue and Beck was driven to the conference as part of the parade.
‘Investor relations today – a new world’ was the theme. It was here in Quebec City that Jacques Cartier, while looking for China, first set foot and founded a ‘new world’.
‘In IR, we’re dealing with a new world and discovering new things every day,’ said Michael Murray, director of investor relations at the Jean Coutu Group and co-chair of the conference, which took place in late May. ‘We have to be as bold and brave as those explorers of 400 years ago.’
At last year’s conference, Ciri started developing ‘tracks’ that are specialized for different levels of experience. The ‘senior IR track’made a return appearance this year in the form of a series of invitationonly sessions for senior Ciri members. ‘This track is similar to an IR magazine think tank – it involves senior practitioners getting together to discuss their concerns from their own particular perspectives,’ explains Sylvia Biggs, Ciri’s director of professional development.
For his part, Murray made the most of the small-cap track, which catered to the growing number of IROs from small caps at the conference. In 2005, 23 percent of attendees were from small caps; this year the proportion was around 40 percent. ‘There were a lot of brand new people in these sessions,’ reports Murray, who is thrilled at breaking the previous Ciri record with 358 registered participants.
New world of trusts
The ‘new world’ theme was no empty symbolism, as was demonstrated with opening sessions focusing on income funds. Keynote speaker Marc Tellier was an IRO at Bell Canada – today he’s CEO of one of Canada’s hottest companies and largest specialty business trusts, Yellow Pages.
Tellier boasted that some 20 percent of his time is devoted to IR-related activities. ‘We like to keep close relationships with our more than 180 institutional investors,’ he said, adding that he likes to end every FD-compliant meeting the same way: ‘Hope you didn’t learn anything today.’ Despite this admonition, Yellow Pages investors appreciate the chance to ‘double-click’ and ‘drill down’ into issues.
The conference’s main honor was reserved for John Wheeler from Telus, who Ciri members presented with this year’s award of excellence. ‘Integrity’ is the word that kept cropping up when discussing him with analysts, said former award winner Tracy Lutz.
Next year, Ciri’s national conference will be held in Whistler, British Columbia.
Breaking records
The National Investor Relations Institute’s (Niri) national conference also had a high turnout, with 1,663 IROs and their camp followers convening in San Diego on June 11 to 14. The first order of business was for Niri chairman Maureen Wolff-Reid to introduce Nancy Humphries as the successor to president and CEO Lou Thompson.
Humphries, the former IRO from BellSouth, showed off an easy southern charm as she urged Niri members to get in touch and tell her what they want. Her 30-year career at BellSouth spanned a range of roles from engineering to human resources – ‘Truly a mix of left brain, right brain, just like IR,’ she joked.
Humphries said her vision for Niri is as a ‘leader in investor relations education, meeting the needs of all our members.’ She also said she will continue the advocacy and lobbying role established by outgoing CEO and veteran Washington player Lou Thompson. Thompson is staying for a 60-day transition period before taking up a new career as a consultant.
The conference co-chairs were IROs Tom Katzenmeyer of Limited Brands and Carol DiRaimo of Applebee’s. They summed up the broad range of companies represented at the conference: 17 percent small-cap and 52 percent mid-cap, with technology and biotech the two largest industry sectors.
First up after the preliminaries was Paul Jacobs, CEO of San Diego-based Qualcomm. He outlined an IR program that reflects Qualcomm’s technology prowess, with 10Ks and 10Qs released the same day as earnings. He also boasted that Qualcomm was one of the first companies to comply with Sarbanes-Oxley Section 404, a year ahead of schedule.
Next was Bobby Kotick, chairman and CEO of Activision, the world’s number two video game maker. ‘With increased regulation, thoughtful IR strategies are more important than ever before,’ Kotick commented as he began an insightful and very amusing account of Activision’s ups and downs.
The main event on the second day was a look ahead at the economy from Abby Joseph Cohen, Goldman Sachs’ chief US investment strategist, who smoothed feathers ruffled by the recent sell-off with reassurances that the US is not sliding into recession. ‘We predicted 2006 would be a memorable year,’ she said. ‘Unfortunately, thus far it has been more memorable than most of us would have liked.’
