Greek shipping magnate George Economou is continuing his shareholder activism campaign with a lawsuit that challenges Stamatis Tsantanis’ purchase of voting control of New York-listed Seanergy Maritime for $250,000.
Economou revealed in a disclosure to US securities regulators after the close of trading on Tuesday that he filed a suit on Monday in the Marshall Islands, where Seanergy is registered.
The lawsuit alleges that Tsantanis’ 2021 buy of voting control “disenfranchised outside stockholders, had no economic rationale, and gave Mr Tsantanis and other members of the Board perpetual control over the Issuer without obtaining a control premium for the issuer’s outside stockholders”.
As TradeWinds has reported, Economou in November revealed a 5.7% stake in capesize specialist Seanergy. The latest filing on Tuesday shows Economou has kept buying shares and is now up to a 9.5% holding in the company.
Economou has given notice that he will wage a proxy fight seeking replacement of directors at Seanergy’s next annual shareholders meeting, the lawsuit states.
TradeWinds has reached out to Tsantanis for comment. Tuesday’s securities filing came well after the close of business hours in Greece, where the listed owner is headquartered.
This is the second time Economou — a one-time governance bad boy in US capital markets — has filed a suit against a Greece-headquartered and New York-listed shipowner.
He filed charges in the New York Supreme Court in November against Performance Shipping, alleging the owner had breached its fiduciary duties to shareholders by taking overwhelming voting control of the company through a dual-class shareholding structure.
Performance has denied those charges and is seeking to have the suit thrown out, asserting among other things that Economou was not a shareholder at the time of the disputed shares transaction and effectively bought into the company to secure a legal claim.
Seanergy first disclosed its own dual-class ownership structure in December 2021.
By paying $250,000, Tsantanis was able to acquire 20,000 Series B preferred shares, each holding 25,000 votes per share. The transaction gave Seanergy’s CEO control of 49.99% of all votes.
Economou’s lawsuit alleges that Seanergy had about $487m in total assets at the time of the purchase. Tsantanis had about 2% of voting power prior to the shares buy, the lawsuit states.
Seanergy defenders hasten to note that there is nothing inherently improper in a dual-ownership structure — otherwise, companies like Google would be in trouble.
Nonetheless, Economou has found a common theme in pursuing litigation under New York and now Marshall Islands law, which is modelled after legal protocols in the US state of Delaware.
“Defendants put their own interests and the interests of Mr Tsantanis above the Issuer’s interests, thereby breaching their fiduciary duties and causing continued harm to Sphinx,” the filing states, making reference to Sphinx Investments, Economou’s investing vehicle.
The complaint seeks, among other things, to cancel the Series B preferred stock, to prohibit Tsantanis from exercising the stock’s voting rights and to bar Seanergy from recognising any votes that have been cast.
