Occidental board claims everything is hunky-dory - sure thing, guys

One sure-fire way of telling a company is in trouble: The board issuing a statement saying the company is not in trouble. That's pretty much what happened on Monday, as the L.A.-based energy company denied any skirmishing among directors over who should be running things. There is "no fight at the top," according to the statement, which follows a WSJ story that said Chairman and former CEO Ray Irani, along with certain directors, were unhappy with the company's direction and wanted to throw out current CEO Stephen Chazen. Even more remarkable than the statement itself is the Wall Street reaction. "That statement is a complete fabrication because every investor knows there's definitely infighting at the top," Livermore Partners managing director David Neuhauser tells Bloomberg. "It's troubling because shareholders know there is so much more value in this company that has yet to be unlocked." Whatever's actually happening in the boardroom, Chazen is in the process of being replaced and Irani is supposed to retire next year. From the LAT:

"It's a mess at the top," said Fadel Gheit, senior energy analyst at Oppenheimer & Co. "I have never heard of a board of directors who starts a succession plan when the CEO is already past retirement age." Gheit called the Occidental board an insular boy's club that desperately needed an infusion of new blood. "The board needs to be replaced. It is too old and too stale," Gheit said. Phil Weiss, an analyst at Argus Research, said he would feel better about the search for a successor to Chazen if it were really based on a desire to find new leadership for the company for the next 10 years. "I just hope it's not a desire to dump him after one bad year," Weiss said.