Good news. From the Wiki page on AIM:
AIM (formerly the Alternative Investment Market) is a sub-market of the London Stock Exchange that was launched on 19 June 1995 as a replacement to the previous Unlisted Securities Market (USM) that had been in operation since 1980. It allows companies that are smaller, less-developed, or want/need a more flexible approach to governance to float shares with a more flexible regulatory system than is applicable on the main market.”
From the Wiki page on the FTSE350:
“The FTSE 350 Index is a market capitalization weighted stock market index made up of the constituents of the FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 indices.[1] The FTSE 100 Index comprises the largest 100 companies by capitalization which have their primary listing on the London Stock Exchange, while the FTSE 250 Index comprises mid-capitalized companies not covered by the FTSE 100, i.e. the 101st to 350th largest.
From the article:
FTSE 350 firms have a voluntary target of 40 per cent female board representation, which the study found only 11 per cent of AIM-listed companies would currently hit.
Meanwhile, the number of all-male boards on London’s junior stock market increased, [J4MB: Good news.] with 38 per cent having no female directors.
Indigo founder Bernadette Young said the results were “disappointing” [J4MB: Oh dear. How sad. Never mind.] and AIM companies “need to consider adopting clearer diversity ambitions”. [J4MB: No, they don’t need to either consider it, or do it. They should continuing recruiting directors as they see fit, a cornerstone of capitalism.]
“Gender diversity transformed over the last few years in the FTSE 350 and reporting has been a big driving factor,” Young told City AM.
She called for transparent search and selection processes to “eliminate unconscious bias”.
[End of extract.]
William Collins’s excellent article on unconscious bias is here.
—————————-
If you’d like email notifications of our new blog pieces, please enter your email address in the box near the top of the right-hand column and click ‘Subscribe’.
We shall shortly be posting this piece on our X channel.
Our YouTube channel is here.