Insured Municipal Income Fund Inc. – Support the Incumbent Directors for Fair, Equal & Expeditious Treatment of All Shareho...
10 Août 2009 - 11:11PM
Business Wire
Insured Municipal Income Fund Inc. (the "Fund") (NYSE: PIF)
today reiterated information previously made public but,
apparently, not considered by Bulldog Investors General Partnership
(“BIGP”) and its principal, Phil Goldstein, in their statements on
Friday, August 7, 2009.
- Liquidation will be submitted to a
shareholder vote promptly. As previously stated,
if re-elected at the August 12, 2009 annual stockholders meeting,
the current Board will submit to shareholders a proposal to
liquidate the Fund. The Board members will actively support the
liquidation proposal, and the Fund will engage in a proxy
solicitation campaign to garner support for the liquidation
proposal. The Board will schedule a shareholder meeting with a
record date that will occur before the end of September 2009. The
meeting date will be before the end of October 2009.
- Liquidation would benefit all holders of the
Fund’s common stock. Contrary to Mr. Goldstein’s
statements of August 7, 2009, this is not a “last minute ploy to
retain control of the Fund.” In light of the significant share
positions accumulated by activist investors and their plans to
conduct substantial tender offers, the Board has concluded that
only liquidation of the Fund will allow ALL of the Fund’s common
shareholders to be treated equitably and receive NAV for their
entire investment in
the Fund. The Board’s proposed approach would benefit long-term
retail investors with relatively small positions, some of whom may
have been with the Fund since its inception in 1993, as well as the
largest institutional investors − who because of the size of their
shareholdings and the limited daily share trading volume on the
NYSE − may not be able to easily sell their share positions without
driving down the price of their shares.
- The Fund’s outstanding Auction Preferred
Shares would also be redeemed. Upon shareholder
approval of the liquidation, the Fund will promptly activate the
mechanisms necessary to call and redeem ALL of the Fund’s Auction
Preferred Shares (“APS”). APS holders would receive payment of
their full liquidation preference, plus such other amounts (e.g.,
accrued interest for the current dividend rate period) as specified
in the Fund’s charter documents.
- Liquidation will occur as promptly as
possible after shareholder approval is obtained.
Liquidation must be accomplished in accordance with the procedures
specified in the Fund’s charter documents and applicable law. As
part of this process, the Fund will liquidate portfolio securities
and reduce its entire portfolio of investments to cash or very
short-term tax-exempt municipal obligations. This will enable
payment to be made to redeem the APS as well as to pay the net
asset value per share to common shareholders as part of a
“liquidating dividend/distribution.” Based on current information,
the Fund sees no reason why liquidation payments could not be made
to all investors well before the end of 2009 if shareholder
approval is obtained in October. It is not in anyone’s interest to
draw out this process, and the Board members and the Fund’s advisor
want to complete the liquidation of the Fund as expeditiously and
responsibly as possible.
- Shareholders should ask themselves who is
better positioned to realize the best value for their common shares
as part of an orderly liquidation. The municipal
bond market in which the Fund is invested is a highly fragmented
dealer market, where the ability to obtain best execution of a
trade often depends on a seller’s knowledge of the market for a
particular bond and familiarity with the other investors in the
market. The Fund’s current advisor, UBS Global Asset Management
(Americas) Inc. (“UBS Global AM”), has years of experience managing
municipal bond portfolios. It has the practical knowledge of the
municipal bond market and contacts with other large, sophisticated
institutional buyers of such securities to enable it to seek best
execution of the multiple transactions necessary to sell the Fund’s
portfolio of hundreds of millions of dollars of municipal bonds.
UBS Global AM believes that carefully managing transaction costs
during an orderly liquidation of the Fund’s portfolio would result
in shareholders obtaining a much better liquidation value than
could be obtained by a less experienced advisor with less
understanding of this marketplace.
- Any successor investment adviser would have
to be approved by Fund shareholders. If Phil
Goldstein and his nominees are elected, some advisor − yet to be
identified and appointed by BIGP’s hand-picked slate of nominees −
will end up managing the Fund’s assets by mid-October 2009. (As
previously indicated, if the dissident Board assumes control, UBS
Global AM will terminate its investment advisory and administration
agreement with the Fund. Such termination will become effective in
mid-October under the terms of the agreement.) While SEC rules
permit a successor board to appoint an interim investment advisor
on its own for the Fund, such approval would be subject to
convening a special meeting of shareholders and obtaining the
statutorily sufficient votes at a meeting to approve a contract
with that as yet unknown and unnamed advisor.
- There are many uncertainties that would arise
out of a victory by the BIGP nominees. What would
happen to the Fund if a sufficient majority of shareholders do not
vote to approve a contract with the replacement for UBS Global AM?
What advisor would be interested in taking on the task of managing
the Fund under strained circumstances knowing that its advisory
contract − and approval of its contractual advisory fees − is
subject to uncertainties related to some future shareholder
meeting? If sufficient votes are not obtained at such a special
meeting of shareholders to approve a new advisory contract, the
Fund could be forced to bear the expense of possible multiple
shareholder meetings, each attempting to obtain the required level
of voting to approve an advisory contract with a new management
company. What will be the transaction costs to the Fund if a new
advisor “repositions” the Fund’s portfolio to better align with its
own investment style? What impact could such uncertainty have on
the market price of the Fund’s shares? We believe that these
uncertainties are far greater than those attendant to a vote to
liquidate the Fund. The current vote tally reports as of Friday,
August 7, indicate that in excess of
60% of the Fund’s outstanding shares are voting in favor of
the proposal recommending that the Board take action to afford
common and preferred shareholders an opportunity to realize the net
asset value of their shares. The only certain way to accomplish
this, given the turn of events, is to let the current Board
liquidate the Fund.
- The current Board initiated the liquidation
proposal. The Fund’s Board has repeatedly issued
letters and press releases communicating to shareholders. In these,
it has put forth concrete information responding to investor
questions. Mr. Goldstein asks “[w]hat recourse will shareholders
have if the incumbent directors subsequently stall the liquidation
process or change their minds entirely?” The current Board has no
interest in “playing games” – it is interested in taking a course
of action that allows it to fulfill its responsibilities and
protect the interests of all investors. While the Board would find
it unfortunate if it is not reelected and allowed to oversee the
process of the final liquidation of the Fund later this year, at
least the current Board members have done what they believed
appropriate to make the best of a difficult situation.
- The Board has taken action to protect the
interests of the Fund and its shareholders. The
Fund has incurred costs in dealing with the multiple efforts to
force it to radically change what had been a respectably performing
closed-end Fund with a track record of providing an uninterrupted
stream of tax-free income through monthly dividends to investors
since 1993. In light of relevant circumstances, the Fund might also
bear the costs of BIGP’s proxy solicitation efforts, which had been
estimated at $150,000. The current Board has a duty to consider
what is in the best interests of the Fund, and based upon that, it
is acting to protect the Fund. Given where things stand now, the
current Board is taking steps to expeditiously move forward in what
it believes to be in the best interests of the Fund and
ALL its shareholders,
large and small.
______________________________
In connection with the August 12, 2009 Annual Meeting, the Fund
has filed a proxy statement and additional soliciting materials
with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC"). Investors
and security holders are strongly advised to read these materials
because they contain important information about the annual
meeting. Free copies of these materials are available on the SEC's
website at www.sec.gov.
The Fund urges its
shareholders to support the Fund's incumbent directors by
completing, signing and dating the WHITE proxy card they have
received, and NOT to sign any GREEN or any other color proxy card
they may receive from BIGP. Shareholders who have previously signed
a GREEN proxy card are urged to revoke that proxy by signing,
dating and mailing the Fund's WHITE proxy
card.
Shareholders who have questions concerning the current proxy
solicitation, or who need assistance in revoking any proxy they may
have previously granted, should contact Georgeson Inc., the Fund's
proxy solicitor, toll free at: 1-877-278-9670.
Insured Municipal Income Fund Inc. is a closed-end management
investment company normally investing substantially all of its
assets in a diversified portfolio of tax-exempt municipal
obligations, with common and preferred shares outstanding. Under
normal circumstances, the Fund invests at least 80% of its net
assets (including the amount of borrowing for investment purposes)
in Insured Municipal Obligations, the income from which is exempt
from regular federal income tax.
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