After three months of hesitation, and despite a desire to bring a CEO to the company from outside, the board of directors at Clal Insurance Enterprises Holdings Ltd. (TASE: CLIS) today decided that the next CEO of Israel's fourth largest insurance company would be deputy CEO Yoram Naveh, who has also been the company's head of resources since January 2014. He previously served as CEO of Clal Finance. Naveh, whose background is not in insurance, is the candidate closest to the company's workers' committee. The decision to appoint Naveh, who got the nod today ahead of Anat Levin, will become effective on July 1, following expected approval from the Capital Markets, Insurance, and Savings Authority.
In recent months following the resignation of former CEO Izzy Cohen, the company board of directors selected an appointments committee that included chairperson Dan Naveh, Judge (ret.) Varda Alshech, Dr. Rachel Adato, Hana Mazal Margaliot, and Gad Arbel. The committee was unable to find a candidate to its liking that could pass the hurdle of approval by the trustee for the controlling shares in the company.
The Capital Markets, Insurance, and Savings Authority prefers the appointment of someone with experience in insurance so that the transition will be as smooth as possible, due to Clal Insurance's challenging business situation and the large volume of its business, which has an important effect on the general public. At the same time, it appears that the board members at Clal Insurance were hesitating between two internal candidates, neither of whom had a background in insurance.
As far as is known, the Capital Markets, Insurance, and Savings Authority, the trustee for the controlling shares in Clal Insurance, and the supervisor of Clal Insurance are very dissatisfied with the conduct of the company's board of directors in the process of selecting a replacement for Izzy Cohen. As far as is known, the Capital Markets, Insurance, and Savings Authority regards what happened at Clal Insurance as improper, and summoned the parties involved for an exceptional talk described by some as a slap in the face and a rebuke in an attempt to cause the Clal board of directors to make a decision.
Naveh, 47, is acquainted with Moshe Tery, the trustee for the controlling shares in the company on behalf of the Capital Markets, Insurance, and Savings Authority from when Tery was chairperson of the Israel Securities Authority. Naveh holds a BA in law and economics from Haifa University and an MA in law and economics from Erasmus University in Rotterdam. Before his appointment as CEO of Clal Finance, he was the investment house's legal counsel. Before joining Clal Finance, he was deputy manager of the corporations department at the Securities Authority. In his term at the Securities Authority, he served under Tery as chairperson. Before working at the Securities Authority, he worked as a lawyer at the Gross, Kleinhendler, Hodak, Halevy, Greenberg & Co. law firm in the commercial department.
The controlling shares in Clal Insurance belong to the IDB group, controlled by Eduardo Elsztain, but the trustee on behalf of the Capital Markets, Insurance, and Saving Authority deprived IDB of the voting rights for the shares.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on June 17, 2018
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