What’s in your shareholder letter?

Your investors or donors deserve meaningful information.
Are you providing it?

Fluff is having a renaissance in shareholder letters these days. The ratio of meaningless words to meaningful information seems to be increasing as companies become more cautious and overmanaged in their communication.

Avoiding accountability, fear of legal liability, poor results, an unclear strategy, marketing spin, and the need to control the narrative are among the reasons CEOs prefer fluff over giving readers the information they need to evaluate performance and results.

A meaningful letter should begin with a summary that includes:

·         What happened this year

·         The main financial event

·         The main strategic progress

·         The main challenge

Let’s compare the opening summaries from two actual 2025 letters.

Summary A (does not follow best practices)

“2025 underscored how thoughtful, consistent strategic actions anchored in a deep understanding of the world can lead to meaningful performance. In last year’s letter, I wrote about the central role of trust in everything we do, and that trust has since deepened into something even more meaningful, shaping how we partner across our work.

“In our industry, the pace and shape of change have accelerated — driven by shifting investor demands, breakthroughs in technology, geopolitical shifts, and a dynamic regulatory landscape that combine to push the frontier of what is possible — opening new avenues for growth for both us and those we serve. As client needs have taken on greater intricacy, we have innovated to enhance capabilities and develop products and solutions that would have been impossible only a few years ago. We continue not only to keep pace with change, but to actively lead change — fulfilling our purpose: to create better outcomes for the world’s investors and the people they serve.”

Summary B (follows best practices)

“I am pleased to report another strong performance for Compass, with organic revenue growth of 8.7% and increased margin. Our resilient balance sheet, excellent cash generation and disciplined capital allocation model support the execution of our strategy, enabling us to invest for future growth as we continue to create long-term value for our shareholders.

“[Our] clear strategy is focused on the delivery of outsourced food services, together with targeted support services. With an addressable global food services market of around $360 billion, we are investing for growth and have acquired businesses that add scale and capability to further enable us to capitalise on this attractive opportunity.

Our sectorised approach, wide-ranging client base, flexible operating models and scale leave us well positioned to capture future demand for outsourced services.”

WHICH SUMMARY IS MORE MEANINGFUL TO YOU?