DHR Increases Ownership Stake in Rival CTPartners

March 1, 2015 – Chicago-based DHR International has increased its ownership position in CTPartners according to an amended Schedule 13D filing made on February 26 with the Securities and Exchange Commission. DHR now owns 553,441 shares of CTPartners’ common stock, representing a 6.3 percent stake in the nation’s seventh largest senior-level recruiting company. DHR has been steadily building a position in its New York-based competitor since late January. In February DHR submitted a formal unsolicited acquisition proposal to the board of CTPartners to acquire 100 percent of its equity. In response, CTPartners’ board of directors formed a special committee to review ‘strategic alternatives” which includes the DHR purchase proposal. The special committee has engaged Robert W. Baird & Co. to act as its financial advisor. HSZ Media has estimated that a combination of the two search concerns would result in a $350 million network of 400 recruiters operating from 75 offices in 24 countries. A decision about the future direction of the company is now imminent, according to inside sources who say “the pressure is on” to make a deal before the company reports its year-end financials on March 12. In related news, a third law firm, Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd, specializing in securities class action and shareholder litigation, has surfaced in New York to encourage shareholders and former employees of CTPartners to come forward with information that could lead to a securities class action lawsuit. They join two other securities class action specialists that have surfaced since the beginning of the year: Kahn Swick & Foti, LLC and Johnson & Weaver. At the center of these firms' investigations is whether CTPartners and/or its officers and directors violated state or federal securities laws surrounding an EEOC investigation into discriminatory practices at the company as well as several recent stock offering attempts.