Huntsman Corporation HUN
Huntsman's decade of missed EBITDA targets and defensive governance demand Board change; Starboard nominates four directors to restore accountability and close the chronic peer-valuation discount.
Thesis
Starboard, one of Huntsman's largest shareholders, argues the chemicals maker's decade-long valuation discount to Celanese, Dow and Eastman reflects chronic execution failure, not inferior assets. Management missed its 2014 ($2.0B EBITDA), 2016 ($1.7B EBITDA) and 2018 (~$60/share by 2020) Investor Day targets; Adjusted EBITDA declined over $350M after 2014 and another $300M from 2018 to 2019, leaving IPO-era shareholders 330% behind chemical peers and 337% behind the S&P 500. Rather than engage constructively on Board refreshment, Peter Huntsman's Board responded defensively: shuffling tenured directors as cover, abridging the director nomination window from nearly a month to ten days via a Sunday-after-New-Year's press release, and refusing a Universal Proxy Card. Starboard therefore nominates James Gallogly, Sandra Beach Lin, Susan Schnabel and Jeffrey Smith at the 2022 Annual Meeting to install independent directors who will finally hold management accountable.
SCQA
Huntsman is a differentiated chemicals manufacturer with strong market positions, diverse portfolios and a difficult-to-replicate manufacturing footprint, yet trades at a decade-long valuation discount to peers Celanese, Dow and Eastman.
Management has missed every major EBITDA target since 2014 by hundreds of millions; the Board responded to engagement defensively by abridging the nomination window, refusing a Universal Proxy Card and reactively shuffling directors.
Starboard nominates four independent directors — James Gallogly, Sandra Beach Lin, Susan Schnabel and Jeffrey Smith — for election at the 2022 Annual Meeting to restore governance, independence and accountability.
Closing Huntsman's peer valuation discount: management's own 2018 roadmap implied ~$60/share by 2020 versus the mid-$20s actual, pointing to substantial upside if execution finally matches long-stated aspiration.
The three reasons
- 1
Huntsman missed EBITDA targets set at its 2014, 2016 and 2018 Investor Days by hundreds of millions
- 2
IPO-era shareholders underperformed chemical peers by 330% and the S&P 500 by 337%
- 3
Board is disenfranchising shareholders: abridged nomination window and refused Universal Proxy Card
Primary demands
- Elect Starboard's four director nominees (Gallogly, Lin, Schnabel, Smith) at the 2022 Annual Meeting
- Adopt a Universal Proxy Card for the contested election
- Reverse the abridged 10-day director nomination window
- Refresh the Board with independent directors experienced in chemicals and industrials
- Hold management accountable for delivering on stated EBITDA and share-price targets
KPIs cited
Pattern membership
Slide gallery ·
Notes
Five-page open letter (not a deck) from Jeffrey C. Smith to Chairman Peter Huntsman. Core rhetorical engine: weaponizing Huntsman's own 2014, 2016 and 2018 Investor Day targets against actual results — a disciplined 'your own promises indict you' device rather than direct CEO quotation. Pages 1-3 carry the argument; pages 4-5 are nominee bios with standard headshots (Gallogly, Lin, Schnabel, Smith). No charts, no sum-of-parts, no formal valuation. Stake not quantified in this letter ('one of the largest shareholders'); 13D was filed Sep 27, 2021. Governance grievances center on Universal Proxy Card refusal and the Jan 2, 2022 Sunday press release abridging the nomination window to ten days. Tone dominantly adversarial ('disenfranchise', 'shareholder-unfriendly tendencies') but framed with collaborative openings and an 'open-minded' settlement-door closer.