A profitable professional services company. Three decades of consistent dividends. A comprehensive shareholder agreement that looked bulletproof on paper. Yet when two major shareholders decided to exit, the company was 24 hours away from insolvency.
The twist? Their accountant had reviewed this shareholder agreement multiple times over the years and never spotted the fatal flaw.
The “comprehensive” agreement was about to destroy the company it was designed to protect.
In the past three months alone, I’ve mediated three separate shareholder disputes. Each time, lawyers and accountants have called me in after the damage was already done. Each time, I hear the same refrain: “We thought the shareholder agreement covered everything.”
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