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April 3 (UPI) -- Disney shareholders defeated a bid by activist investor Nelson Peltz to replace two board members Wednesday in a proxy win for CEO Bob Iger. The bid to oust Maria Elena Lagomasino and Michael Froman was launched by Peltz' Trian Partners, which tried to put Peltz and former Disney CFO Jay Rasulo on the board instead.
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Peltz lost by a two-to-one margin , with some 94% of the retail shareholders voting supporting Iger's choice over Peltz. Rasulo lost five-to-one.
"I want to thank our shareholders for their trust and confidence in our Board and management. With the distracting proxy contest now behind us, we're eager to focus 100% of our attention on our most important priorities: growth and value creation for our shareholders and creative excellence for our consumers," Iger said in a statement.
Iger and the board fought hard to prevent Peltz and Rasulo from winning board seats.
On a proxy campaign website before Wednesday's vote, Disney said influential shareholders like Lucasfilm founder George Lucas, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon and former Disney CEO Michael Eisner support the current board.
Iger said before the proxy vote that "activist investors" were distracting the company with board candidates "presented by these activist hedge funds."
Speaking about the Disney board in a video before Wednesday's proxy battle loss at restorethemagic.com Peltz said the proxy challengers were aligned in their desire "fundamentally and crudely" to see stock prices increase.
"It's time for the board to understand that big board fees and management with huge compensation owe something to us. We want to make sure that all the shareholders, not just guys like us," he said.
Disney shares are up by 48% since Trian Partners campaign to change the board began, but Peltz has argued the company could be doing better, especially with its streaming products.
Disney is up by 36% year-to-date.
Peltz has a $3.98 billion stake in Disney, roughly 2% of company shares.
