Investors in Vestas? Sell your shares...

"To Vestas, being No. 1 means being the best. Vestas should manufacture the best and most reliable turbines, Vestas should be the most effective wind turbine manufacturer, Vestas should have the greenest production, and Vestas should maintain the best customer and supplier relations in the industry. Vestas should be the most valuable wind turbine manufacturer."  http://www.vestas.com/

but don't forget  http://savevestas.wordpress.com/ "The next steps for us are to get all the groups and unions together and promote green jobs on the Island – we really want this to be a true Eco Island" - Justin Moody - ex-Vestas employee

and the valuable local, independent media blog -  http://ventnorblog.com/topic/vestas-sit-in/

"Being a trustworthy partner to its stakeholders, Vestas seeks to provide timely, adequate and simultaneous information about the company's business activities with a view to ensuring consistently strong interest in the Vestas share.

In recent years, there has been great interest in the Vestas share. During the first half of 2009, the Vestas share was the most traded share on the NASDAQ OMX Copenhagen with a turnover of approx EUR 13bn. Furthermore, the Vestas share was among the five most traded shares in the OMX Nordic 40 index.

The share closed the half year at DKK 380.50, equal to a market capitalisation of approx EUR 10bn. During the first half year 2009, the price of the Vestas share increased by 25 per cent."

"At 31 July 2009, Vestas had 115,278 registered shareholders, who combined represented 178,725,654 shares, or approx 88 per cent of Vestas' share capital. At the end of July 2009, approx 60 per cent of Vestas' registered capital was held by the company's 50 largest shareholders, including custodian banks.

Based on the information available as at 31 July 2009, an estimated 70 per cent of Vestas' total share capital, including shares not registered by name, was believed to be held by shareholders outside Denmark."

"In accordance with the Danish Companies Act, section 28 (a and b), no shareholder has informed the company that they own more than five per cent of the share capital:"

"The Board’s general intention is to recommend a dividend of 25-30 per cent of the net result of the year. However, the paying out of dividends will always take into consideration the Group’s plans for growth and liquidity requirements.

At the Annual General Meeting in 2009, it was decided that no dividend would be paid in respect of 2008 based on the Group's comprehensive need for capital investments and its need for strong capital resources."

"The following analysts cover the Vestas share:

Broker Analyst Telephone No.
ABG Sundal Collier, Denmark Stig Frederiksen +45 3318 6117
Alm. Brand Markets, Denmark Michael Friis Jørgensen +45 3547 6923
Ardour Capital, Germany Scott McCollister +49 30 2757 4855
Barclays Capital, UK Rupesh Madlani +44 20 3134 7503
BBVA, Spain Daniel Ortea +34 91 537 0550
Broadpoint.AmTech, USA John Hardy +1 203 532 7333
Carnegie, Denmark Claus Almer +45 3288 0320
Citigroup, UK Mark Fielding +44 20 7986 4018
Collins Stewart, UK Tom Plinston +44 20 7523 8418
Commerzbank/Dresdner, Germany Ingo-Martin Schachel +49 69 136 43021
Credit Agricole Cheuvreux, Sweden Daniel Ovin +46 8723 5175
Credit Suisse, UK Mark Freshney +44 20 7888 0887
Danske Markets Equities, Denmark Peter Rothausen +45 4512 8047
Deutsche Bank, Spain Daniel Gandoy Lopez +34 91 782 8445
DnB NOR Markets, Norway Trygve Lauvdal +47 2294 8932
Erik Penser Bankaktiebolag, Sweden Johan Widmark +46 8463 8077
Execution Limited, UK Nick Paton +44 20 7456 1190
Fondsfinans, Norway Håkon Levy +47 2311 3047
Forum Securities, Norway Sverre Ardø +47 2328 2615
Goldman Sachs, UK Jason Channell +44 20 7051 5029
Handelsbanken, Denmark Kitty Grøn +45 3341 8295
HSBC, UK James Magness +44 77 6700 4667
Jefferies International, UK Michael McNamara +44 20 7029 8680
JPMorgan, UK Andreas Willi +44 20 7325 4853
Jyske Bank, Denmark Christian Nagstrup +45 8989 7036
Macquarie, UK Kasper From Larsen +44 20 3037 4091
Merrill Lynch, UK Matthew Yates +44 20 7996 4537
Morgan Stanley, UK Allen Wells +44 20 7425 4146
Nordea Markets, Denmark Patrik Setterberg +45 3333 6294
NORD/LB, Germany Holger Fechner +49 511 361 5305
PiperJaffray Ltd., UK Alastair Bishop +44 20 3142 8812
Redburn Partners, UK Archie Fraser +44 20 7000 2070
Royal Bank of Scotland, UK Teea Reijonen +44 20 7678 1261
Sandford C. Bernstein Limited, UK Martin Prozesky +44 20 7170 5077
SEB Enskilda, Denmark Niels Granholm Leth +45 3697 7531
Simmons & Co. Int., USA Pearce W. Hammond +1 713 546 7246
Societe Generale, France Didier Laurens +33 1 4213 5078
Standard & Poor's, UK Ankit Jain +44 20 7176 3221
Sydbank, Denmark Jacob Pedersen +45 7436 4452
UBS, Germany Patrick Hummel +49 69 1369 8295

Disclaimer
According to Vestas' information, the analysts listed above cover the Vestas share. Analyses from these analysts have not been presented to the company for approval. Vestas thus disclaims the content of such analyses."

"Vestas pursues a communication and investor relations policy which involves ensuring timely, adequate and simultaneous information about the company to the outside world, and Vestas strives to be visible and accessible to current and potential shareholdedrs, investors and stakeholders with due consideration to legal requiremtns and rooted in corporate governance standards.

Vestas has a four-week ‘closed’ period prior to disclosure of a financial report. During this period, communication with analysts, media and investors is restricted."

"In order to ensure that Vestas Wind Systems A/S fulfills its stated obligations, we have entered into an agreement with NASDAQ OMX' news distribution service on the distribution of all company announcements and press releases from Vestas Wind Systems A/S.

Local press releases are only distributed locally, while announcements on insider trading are only published here on this website.

Receive announcements from Vestas by e-mail
If you would like to receive company announcements and press releases from Vestas Wind Systems A/S by e-mail, you can sign up for our news service:  http://www.vestas.com/en/investor/contact-ir/news-service.aspx"

"Vestas publishes its financial results four times a year: One annual report and three quarterly financial reports. The time of publication can be seen below. Furthermore, it is possible to watch Vestas' financial presentations online as they are all webcast - Follow link.

Coming financial events 2009:
27.10.09 Quarterly report for Q3 2009 and expectations for 2010"

"With a 20 per cent market share, Vestas is the No. 1 supplier of modern energy solutions. We have installed more than 39,000 wind turbines in 63 countries on five continents. We install an average of one wind turbine every three hours, twenty-four hours a day. In fact, our wind turbines generate more than 60 million MWh of energy per year, or enough electricity to supply millions of households."

Find your nearest Vestas premises:
" http://www.vestas.com/en/about-vestas/find-vestas.aspx"

And if you're heading to Denmark for some reason in the next few months (ahem...coughenhagen...)
"Headquarter
Vestas Wind Systems A/S
Alsvej 21
8940 Randers SV
Denmark
Phone: (+45) 97 30 00 00
Fax: (+45) 97 30 00 01
 vestas@vestas.com"

With Vestas shares so profitable, I doubt that list of the worlds biggest investment banks will give up their money-making shares because Vestas made 600 workers redundant and weren't a very nice company because they moved their alleged 'green' jobs to another part of the world. How will this campaign succeed?

hello A. I'm assuming that's A for hardcore anticapitalist anarchist, but my paranoid side is going "troll alert, troll alert, troll alert"

erm... if you'd actually looked at the link you'd have seen that today the share price is down 5 points, or 1.44%.

obviously the share price falling has nothing whatsoever to do with the ongoing campaign against Vestas' treatment of their workers, or this post. The market will go down, as well as up, after all. But the shares were rising steadily in the first quarter of this year... just at the Newport factory was profitable then too... hmmm

Actually the 'A' refers to neither a hardcore anti-capitalist anarchist (although a hardcore pro-capitalist anarchist would be a sad sack of shite and oxymoron) nor to my being a troll. I've always been more of an ogre. So you can stem your needless paranoia that only a troll would post something that actually asks a question of another post.

The 'A' in question stands for Aardwark which is what such a campaign based on Vestas share prices would be.

I did look at the link, thanks, but Vestas is not going down the pan because it's shares rise and fall on the stock market. As you yourself say, the Vestas campaign or this proposal has a very limited effect on their shares prices.

Today the range of Vestas share prices was between 341.00 - 352.00. That's just fluctuation.
 http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=VWS.CO#chart1:symbol=vws.co;range=1d;indicator=volume;charttype=line;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=on;source=undefined

My questions, which you ignored, is how would such a campaign work? As you are someone who is regularly posting news of activism around the Vestas struggle, maybe you can answer that question? Most of the other info you posted suggests that Vestas is probably a good investment op so I'm not sure what the point is you're getting at. Those banks still aren't dumping their Vestas shares and showing Vestas the door because they think Vestas is bad and naughty to the planet.

The problem of this kind of moralistic thinking is that you can't win a workers struggle by asking bosses and international capitalists to be nice. In fact, it harms any struggle where it becomes taken up because it's pissing in the wind even if you thinkthe moral highground (a good place to piss by the way) will win a struggle.

Solidarity and action that stems from that solidarity is what wins a struggle. Bodies on the ground win the struggle. At Vestas there is a lot of support and good will and some splendid (if activisty) displays of solidarity but at the end of the day, the occupation is over, the picketing has not proved sucessful due to lack of numbers and the support around the world has been limited to good luck messages, donations and pictures on the campaign site but it has not seen secondary action in support of the occupiers/workers, any blockades nationally and internationally that are effective blocks to the company nor any taking up of the campaign nationally by any significant mass of supporters.

What the workers and supporters did in the first few weeks was amazing and inspirational but now it just seems like a bit of an activist circus that can't make much difference to the factory closure etc apart from the hoped for reinstatement of the redundency for the 11 occupiers. I hope that happens.

agreed. but rather than shitting on it, how about getting your hands dirty. i don't for a minute believe that the share price is a crucial element of this camapaign if compared with solidarity actions and further occupations. but to say that the campaign is over because the occupation was evicted is laughable. milliband is meeting the council on the 15th, caroline lucas on friday. i don't have an awful lot of time for either of these people, but if they're concerned enough about what's going on to actually bother visiting, i'd wager the campaign isn't over yet.

"accentuate the positive"

(i assure you that i'm fully pessimistic, realistic, and not in the least bit blinded by hope over this campaign. it just fucks me off slightly that so many activists are so short-term in their offers of solidarity. since when did we ever win in a month? )

Well, I didn't mean to shit on it. More to say, what is this share price thing about? Also, you shouldn't assume that just because I'm critical that I am also not getting my hands dirty somewhere.

Anyhow, you posted the 'share price - sell your shares' post originally and I was responding to that.
You now say 'i don't for a minute believe that the share price is a crucial element of this camapaign if compared with solidarity actions and further occupations. but to say that the campaign is over because the occupation was evicted is laughable'

Well, unpack that line and what have you got? That a share campaign isn't up to much compared to occupations and actions. But there is no occupation nor has there been a re-occupation and a bunch of activists are doing actions of the kind that activists do but where are the majority of the Vestas workers in all this? It's not to pour shit on something to try and look and be realistic about what is going on on the ground. Look at the recent Visteon dispute and see why that was more successful - two occupations and picketing and the workers themselves involved in the struggle. But this has not turned out to be that way, sadly, at Vestas.

By the way, all this talk of 'activists' rubs me up the wrong way anyway. Since when has the everyday politics of trying to destroy capitalism become the special task or job of people who call themselves activists. If you think you're a bit of an 'activist' then its really worth reading the text 'Give Up Activism' for some good thoughts and analysis of the activist role:

 http://www.eco-action.org/dod/no9/activism.htm
 http://www.eco-action.org/dod/no9/activism_postscript.htm

'The activist is a specialist or an expert in social change. To think of yourself as being an activist means to think of yourself as being somehow privileged or more advanced than others in your appreciation of the need for social change, in the knowledge of how to achieve it and as leading or being in the forefront of the practical struggle to create this change.

Activism, like all expert roles, has its basis in the division of labour - it is a specialised separate task. The division of labour is the foundation of class society, the fundamental division being that between mental and manual labour. The division of labour operates, for example, in medicine or education - instead of healing and bringing up kids being common knowledge and tasks that everyone has a hand in, this knowledge becomes the specialised property of doctors and teachers - experts that we must rely on to do these things for us. Experts jealously guard and mystify the skills they have. This keeps people separated and disempowered and reinforces hierarchical class society.'



PS What are Milliband and then Lucas meeting about at Vestas? Where do you think the Vestas campaign can now go to win the fight?

email me, because this isn't the place to have this debate. yes you raise valid and interesting points, but you clearly aren't completely well informed, or you'd know that actually, workers are still involved (even though, as with everything, with all sections of community, it would be great if more were, and more deeply). there is little division between workers and 'activists' and locals, and yes i've read that text, it's very good, and no, i don't really consider myself an 'actvist'. but semantics can get a bit too much and sometimes a word really is just a word, used as shorthand to convey complicated meaning. we've only really had language for a short bit of our existence as a species (hmm.. seems to coincide with the shitty hiearchichal bit!), so it's hardly suprising that those of us who would agree end up disagreeing over it. that'll be the tower of babel for ya... (i ain't religious either, before you start on that one...). cheers for your interest and thought provocation and apologies for any insult...

corporate repost... but relevant!

 http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_13529445

Vestas Wind shares decline
The Denver Post
Posted: 10/10/2009 01:00:00 AM MDT

Shares of Vestas Wind Systems A/S, the world's biggest maker of wind turbines with facilities in Colorado, dropped to the lowest since April in Copenhagen after Svenska Handelsbanken AB cut its recommendation to "reduce" from "accumulate."

The U.S. turbine market will grow 5 percent in 2010, compared with a previous estimate of 32 percent, Handelsbanken analyst Kitty Gron said in a note Friday.