It is hard to believe that we are already heading into the fourth quarter - which means many of you will be in the midst of preparing for your quarterly earnings. Your chapter has been quite busy since our last update. Before we delve into those details, we would like to congratulate fellow IR professionals who successfully completed the second IRC examinations in September - several of whom are Virtual Chapter members: Lee M. Ahlstrom, Jessica L. Hansen, Anne-Marie Megela, Raj K. Mehan and Thomas B. Ward. You can read the full release here .

Professional Development Update

We are committed to delivering relevant, thought-provoking and educational programming, and you won't be disappointed by the roster of programs that the Professional Development Committee has put together for 2016-2017. We started the year off strong with an update from Wells Fargo economist, Sarah House in September. We also recently held our first café chat of the year with Valerie Haertel, Global Head of Investor Relations at BNY Mellon and Chair, NIRI Advocacy Committee, and Ted Allen, Director of Regulatory Affairs and Practice Resources at NIRI. Valerie and Ted gave us a detailed update of the meeting between NIRI's Advocacy Committee and SEC staff to discuss proposed changes to equity ownership disclosure rules and the need for greater SEC oversight of proxy advisory firms.

Both events were well attended and, in case you missed them, you can access the archives here . Our next event is scheduled for October 25 at 12:00 pm EDT, and the topic will be Understanding Options Activity and Strategies. Our full programming lineup for the year can be found here .

 

Membership Update

In September 2015, the Membership Committee introduced our Virtual Program Partners, an initiative to provide our high-quality programming to other Chapters and supplement their program needs. We would like to welcome new and returning partners: Boston, Central Ohio, Cleveland/Northern Ohio, Kansas City, Rocky Mountain, Seattle, South Florida and Triangle Chapters.

We are excited to work closely with these chapters and their members once again in 2016-2017.

Sponsorship Update

Our sponsors and their support are crucial to the success of our chapter. We would like to thank the following Virtual Chapter sponsors for their continued support. When appropriate, please express your appreciation for their sponsorship of Virtual Chapter if you actively engage with them:

Gold Level Financial Sponsors : Broadridge, S&P Global Market Intelligence and TalkPoint

Silver Level Financial Sponsors : IPREO and Q4

Bronze Level Sponsors : Business Wire, Corbin Perception, Craib Design & Communications and Pressley Johnson Design

 

We look forward to updating you in our next newsletter scheduled for early 2017.

Sincerely,

Sheryl Joyce, Perfect Channel LTD and Tripp Sullivan, SCR Partners LLC

Investor targeting and shareholder outreach are at the heart of an IRO's mandate, and a critical measure of an IR program's success.  In fact, the quality of investor one-on-one meetings is the most widely used qualitative metric employed to judge the effectiveness of an IR program (BNY Mellon "Global Trends in Investor Relations - 2015").

Given the importance of investor meetings and shareholder outreach, it is critical that an IRO leverages all of his/her resources to secure meetings and ensure that those meetings are as effective and productive as possible. Q4 dives into how IROs are leveraging real-time surveillance to navigate today's trading ecosystem and pinpoint the most qualified targets available.