Boston, MA 06/12/2014 (wallstreetpr) – The Annual Shareholders Meeting at Target Corporation (NYSE:TGT) concluded yesterday and did not see much of the attendance or questions. The meeting was the first one since the data breach happened, where the interim board chairwoman, Roxanne S. Austin and John J. Mulligan, the interim chief executive openely accepted that the year was the worst one in its history.
In Action
During the last one year, the company witnessed a blundorous breach of customer data during Christmas and also saw a disastrous opening of over 100 new stores in Canada. Since the departure of Chief Executive, Gregg Steinhafel, the executives at the company have been trying to fill in a sense of action, instead of keeping quiet until the arrival of the new leadership.
The actions could be seen from the company’s announcement at the meeting about the hiring of a new chief information security officer. Brad Maiorano from General Motors Company (NYSE:GM) is roped in the new role to take care of the information security and risk. The company had taken a hit during the late last year from the customer breach, where nearly 40 million credit card numbers were stolen and more than 70 million had lost their data. In addition to this, the company has also planned to undertake structural changes in order to help make a better decision making.
Dividend Hike
At the same time, on contrary to the views that the company’s board should not be elected back on account of the latest data breach that points out to the board’s inability to deal with security, a preliminary voting announced at the meeting indicate the re-election of all of the board members. Along sidethis, Target Corporation (NYSE:TGT) also declared that its board members have decided to raise the quarterly dividend by as much as 21%. With the new hike, the shareholders are set to receive dividend payment of $0.52 per share on Sept. 10, 2014.
