Western Investment Delivers Letter to Stockholders of DWS RREEF World Real Estate Fund, Inc. (NYSE:DRP) Regarding Adjourned A...
16 Julio 2010 - 9:50AM
Business Wire
On July 16, 2010, Western Investment LLC delivered a letter to
stockholders of DWS RREEF World Real Estate Fund, Inc. (NYSE: DRP)
regarding DRP’s adjourned annual meeting of stockholders. DRP is
controlled by Deutsche Bank AG (NYSE: DB) through its subsidiary
Deutsche Investment Management Americas Inc. (together with its
affiliates, “Deutsche”). The full text of the letter follows.
STOCKHOLDERS OF DWS RREEF WORLD
REAL ESTATE FUND, INC.
YOUR IMMEDIATE ATTENTION IS
REQUESTED
Dear Fellow Stockholder:
We are writing to inform you that the Annual Meeting of
Stockholders (the “Annual Meeting”) of DWS RREEF World Real Estate
Fund, Inc. (the “Fund”) has been adjourned to Monday August 9, 2010
at 2:00 p.m., Eastern Time, at the New York Marriott Eastside, 525
Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10017. The Annual Meeting was
adjourned because there were not enough votes present to constitute
a quorum. If you have not yet voted it is important that you
return your proxy and vote your shares today. Without a quorum
there will likely be a failed meeting. Voting is your opportunity
to send a message to management today.
We call on the Fund to take all reasonable action to permit a
valid meeting including, without limitation, reducing the quorum
requirements to 33 1/3% of the shares outstanding, a level used by
these same directors and investment adviser at other closed-end
funds. Alternatively, if no quorum is reached at the Annual
Meeting, the Fund could call a special meeting for the purpose of
electing directors and voting on Western Investment’s proposal.
Western Investment is the largest stockholder of the Fund,
owning approximately 12% of the Fund’s shares. We are seeking your
support on the GOLD proxy card FOR the election of FOUR
INDEPENDENT nominees to the Fund’s Board of Directors, and FOR our
proposal to take the necessary steps to declassify the Board so
that all directors are reelected on an annual basis.
The Board has repeatedly imposed its arrogant views on
stockholders of how the Fund should be managed. They are a
disgrace to the free market system and an insult to democracy
itself.
Time and again, Deutsche Investment Management Americas Inc.
(“Deutsche”), the investment advisor for your Fund, and its
handpicked Board of Directors (the “Board”) have used legal
gimmicks to ignore the votes of stockholders in the multiple
closed-end funds managed by Deutsche. Since the Fund’s inception
they have presided over disastrous long-term performance. In
addition, your Fund is plagued by a persistent discount to net
asset value, abysmal corporate governance and an ineffective and
compromised Board. They have enacted corporate governance measures
for the sole purpose of entrenching the Board and management
without regard to their effect on stockholders.
Original investors in the Fund have lost two-thirds of their
investment. The Fund trades at unacceptably steep discounts to its
net asset value, a situation that disadvantages stockholders and is
exacerbated by the Board’s and Deutsche’s do-nothing strategy.
Stockholders paid (split-adjusted) $40.00 per share in the Fund’s
public offering. It is trading today at about $13.74. The Fund has
had a negative -19.33% annualized return. Since inception, the
Fund’s total return has been a negative -46.97%. STOCKHOLDERS
CANNOT AFFORD TO SIT BACK! THE TIME TO ACT IS NOW!
Despite this abysmal performance, directors continue to collect
fees of over $200,000 per year (from the Deutsche family of funds
complex of more than 100 funds) without even acknowledging the
plight of stockholders. We seriously question directors who collect
exorbitant fees and oversee corporate governance that has been
dubious at best, while stockholders have seen the Fund fall 50%
since inception.
RISK METRICS GROUP/ISS SUPPORTS WESTERN INVESTMENT NOMINEES
AND PROPOSAL
We are pleased to note that RiskMetrics Group/ISS, a leading
proxy advisory service that provides analyses and vote
recommendations to major institutional investors worldwide, has
recommended that stockholders vote on the GOLD proxy for our
nominees and for our proposal to declassify the Board so that all
directors face election annually instead of every three years.
In supporting Western Investment’s proposal to declassify the
Board, RiskMetrics/ISS agreed with Western Investment, stating that
“the only real motive for implementing a [classified board] is to
make it more difficult to change control of the board.”
Additionally, in reaching its conclusion, RiskMetrics/ISS
highlighted the fact that “empirical evidence has suggested that [a
classified board] is not in shareholders’ best interests from a
financial perspective.”
BE AWARE THAT UNLESS AND UNTIL A QUORUM IS PRESENT, YOU WILL
BE UNABLE TO VOTE AT THE ADJOURNED MEETING. The presence at the
adjourned meeting of a majority of the shares outstanding and
entitled to vote at the Annual Meeting constitutes a quorum.
Your vote can be cast quickly and easily by signing, dating
and mailing the enclosed proxy card in the postage-paid return
envelope provided. You may also vote by telephone or
Internet by following the instructions on your proxy card.
We urge you to vote the GOLD proxy today by following the
simple instructions for telephone or internet voting on the
GOLD proxy card. Alternatively, you can sign date and return
your GOLD proxy in the postage paid envelope provided.
YOUR VOTE IS IMPORTANT, NO MATTER HOW LARGE OR SMALL YOUR
HOLDINGS MAY BE
If you have any questions or require assistance in voting,
please contact our proxy solicitor at the numbers given on the back
page. Thank you for your support.
Regards,
Arthur D. Lipson
If you have any questions or need
assistance voting your Shares, please call:
Innisfree M&A
Incorporated
501 Madison Avenue, 20th
Floor
New York, NY 10022
Stockholders Call Toll-Free at:
(877) 687-1873
Banks and Brokers Call Collect at:
(212) 750-5833
You may also contact Western
Investment LLC via email at
info@fixmyfund.com
We question the Board’s
accountability
We question the Board’s
objectivity
We question the Board’s
independence
We question the Board’s
record
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