Brian: Fair comment. I just tend to have trouble seeing why the hiring of an IR consultant counts as "news." More often, it's the first bit of advice the IR firm gives. (Yes, I used to work for one and No, we did not want clients to tell the world in this form.)
In any case, it's an issue that's only sometimes a "problem". The fact is, most external IR firms are PR, media relations, and image consultants which have picked up on the IR market. The result sometimes is that these consultants get so busy looking for the "happy face" that they ignore the ongoing, central issue of credibility.
Having said this, if nobody knows what you are doing, you tend to fade into the background, so good IR is (in my biased opinion) critical in separating the best companies from the crowd.... that is, if they have a good story to tell in the first place.
I don't know this company so my comments aren't meant to be specific.
Cheers
Greg |
