Harvey Norman's billionaire founder Gerry Harvey has demanded shareholders tell him what more they expect on top of rising sales and profits after the retailer faced down a potential revolt over board remuneration.
The Australian Shareholders Association had advised stock holders to vote against the remuneration resolution at Tuesday's annual general meeting due to concerns over the composition of the long-term incentives.
That raised the prospect of a spill vote that occurs if more than a quarter of shareholders vote against remuneration for two straight years.
The spill was averted as the resolution passed with more than 94 per cent of votes in favour, but Mr Harvey was flabbergasted that shareholders would even consider opposing a reward structure he said was more than reasonable given the company's recent performance.
The electronics and furniture retailer last month reported a first quarter pre-tax profit, excluding property revaluations, of $91.8 million - up 28 per cent from a year earlier.
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That followed a 26.6 per cent rise in annual net profit to $268.1 million for 2014/15.
"What more do you want us to do?" Mr Harvey asked at the meeting in Sydney.
"I think `holy s***, what do these people want? What do they expect? Anything less than double your profits and it's `you're no good to me mate, what are you doing there on that board?'"
ASA representative Nick Bury said his organisation wanted long-term incentives (LTI) to be dependent on earnings per share rather than return on net assets.
Director Chris Brown, the chairman of the board's remuneration committee, opined that the ASA had only raised objections to the resolution because it had failed to read it properly.
"You were suggesting that the LTI contains a variety of measures other than financial; it doesn't, as a result of the comments that were made at the last meeting," Mr Brown said.
"I'm being as polite as I can. It may be that we are inelegant in our use of the language, but it's clearly set out in the report that the LTI hurdles are financial and they are a real stretch."
Mr Harvey has long proclaimed his frugality with respect to his lifestyle and what he says is Harvey Norman's relative parsimony with executive pay.
"We do not pay our directors too much money," he said.
"If you earn a million dollars at Harvey Norman, you earn it. You don't just get it."
The ASA was also unhappy at the lack of independent directors on the board.
But Mr Harvey, whose wife Katie Page is chief executive, had no intention of becoming anything other than the family company it is now.
Mr Harvey told shareholders they were being "conned" by analysts who didn't have any "skin in the game".
Ms Page said Harvey Norman would "never" move into China and is concentrating on its eight current markets: Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, Slovenia, Croatia, Ireland and Northern Ireland.
