QVT Financial believes that Top Ships' board and management may have breached their fiduciary duties, and called for the company to make a "substantial change" to the composition of its board. QVT said that Top Ships has entered into a "continuing succession of transactions suffering from serious conflicts of interests" between the company and management, or between the company and third parties that have material outside business dealings and relationships with management. QVT currently holds 2,899,568 shares (10.35% of the total outstanding).

Elliott Associates has communicated to MSC its belief that the company should consider exploring strategic alternatives, including a possible sale. Elliott said that it reserves the right to further discuss or meet with the company's management, board, potential acquirers, financing sources or other shareholders and may formulate plans or proposals regarding the company. Elliott currently owns about 4.13 million shares (9.2%).

Trinad Capital Master Fund sent a letter to the company's board demanding that the board remove Chairman Barry Bergsman. The hedge fund urged the directors to take immediate action to explain some options granted to Bergsman on April 25. Trinad demanded that the options be immediately surrendered and terminated. Trinad Capital has 4,909,375 shares (8.8%).

A group including Brener International Group says that it wants the company to consider the interests of stockholders and engage in "meaningful repurchases" of the company's stock. Brener believes that management continues to "lack any plan to boost the company's stock price and, generally, seems to lack business acumen." He also says that the stock-purchase program continues at an "anemic pace," even though management considers the shares undervalued. The Brener group reported ownership of 7,475,000 shares (5.62%) as of Dec. 28, 2007.

Worthington Chairman and CEO John P. McConnell reported holding 19,206,156 shares (23.9%). McConnell's holdings in Worthington recently rose above the 5% threshold after the passing of his father, John H. McConnell, on April 25. McConnell has served as a director of Worthington continuously since 1990.

Billionaire investor Edward Lampert raised his stake to about 69.13 million shares (38.7%). In open-market purchases from April 28 to May 9, Lampert, chairman of Sears Holding (SHLD), bought about 1.82 million shares, for an average price of $16.04 apiece.

Crescent Capital VI intends to purchase additional shares and to seek regulatory approval to permit Crescent to increase its stake to more than 10%. Last year, Crescent proposed taking the bank-holding company private for $15 a share in cash, but Cowlitz rejected the proposal, saying the offer was too low. Last month, Cowlitz also declined Crescent's request to appoint a Crescent representative to the board, stating that doing that wouldn't be in shareholders' long-term interest. Crescent intends to seek regulatory approval to permit it to buy additional shares and increase its influence on the board. Crescent Capital currently holds 483,000 shares (9.6%).

What's Happening: Water Asset Management is conducting a proxy fight to fix the size of the board at six directors and elect five WAM nominees. WAM believes that the company has been poorly managed and urges the board to hire an investment banker to explore strategic alternatives, including a sale.