OLYMPIA – A pastor who had threatened a national boycott against Microsoft and other major companies for supporting a gay civil rights bill is now pushing for an unlikely protest, urging people to buy up the companies’ stock and then dump it to drive prices down.
The Rev. Ken Hutcherson, pastor of Antioch Bible Church in Redmond, home to the software company’s headquarters, says he wants to use the stock market to make a political point. But one market expert laughed at the idea.
“The chances of him being successful with that are slim to none, and slim just left town,” said Hans Olsen, chief investment officer at Bingham Legg Advisers.
Hutcherson said last week he was calling for a boycott of the companies, but said Tuesday that the stock-dumping plan, which calls on people to sell the companies’ shares on May 1, had been his strategy all along.
“You got to find out how you affect a company,” Hutcherson said, conceding that it would be hard to get people to shun products from companies that dominate the marketplace the way Microsoft and Boeing do.
“For me to ask people not to buy their product would be stupid,” Hutcherson said. Instead, he wants his supporters to buy one or two shares over the next few months.
“All of us get together on the same day and sell our stock, just run it in the ground,” Hutcherson said. “The only way you can deal with these companies is (to) affect their stock.”
But experts said the pastor’s plan has no realistic chance of hurting the stock price of a company such as Microsoft.
There are about 10.6 billion Microsoft shares outstanding with a collective value of about $280 billion. At that price, if every person in the United States bought $100 worth of Microsoft stock, together they would own about 11 percent of the company.
Olsen also said few investors would gamble their money on a political statement, especially big investors, such as those who hold major blocks of shares in mutual funds.
“The big guys, they won’t touch that with somebody’s else 10-foot pole, let alone their own,” Olsen said.
Sean O’Connor, assistant professor of law at the University of Washington, said the pastor’s plan also could be considered illegal market manipulation, depending on exactly how he encourages people to take part in his plan.
Hutcherson acknowledged that people may be hesitant to part with valuable stock.
“It’s a sacrifice,” he said. “If they don’t follow me, I’ve lost nothing.”
Earlier this month, several companies, including Microsoft Corp., Boeing Co., Hewlett-Packard Co. and Nike Inc., signed a letter urging passage of the measure, which would add “sexual orientation” to a state law that already bans discrimination in housing, employment and insurance based on race, gender, age, disability, religion, marital status and other factors.
Hewlett-Packard and Boeing released statements Tuesday reaffirming their support of the measure. The other companies did not immediately return calls on Tuesday.
Microsoft’s pitch for the bill comes a year after it was denounced for quietly dropping its support.
Hutcherson was at the middle of the Microsoft controversy last year. He claimed he pressured Microsoft into dropping its support by threatening a boycott.
The company, under fire from gay activists across the country, insisted it had decided to take a neutral stance to focus on other issues.
Hutcherson, who last week claimed the support of major national Christian organizations, said that he hasn’t yet talked with them about his buy-sell plan.
Christopher Norfleet, a spokesman for Focus on the Family, in Colorado Springs, Colo., said that Hutcherson had not yet contacted them, but that they would like to talk with him about the idea.
“We think that would be an interesting idea,” Norfleet said.
Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, in Washington, D.C., said in a written statement: “We agree with him on the issues but we haven’t been asked to join this effort and we haven’t taken a position on it.”
Hutcherson’s announcement came hours before he testified before a Senate committee on the gay rights bill, which was passed out of the House last Friday. The bill passed the Senate committee Tuesday on a 7-3 vote, and could come to a vote on the Senate floor by the end of this week.
Fran Dunaway, executive director of Equal Rights Washington, said she didn’t think the bill would lose any support from the companies.
“The coalition of businesses that came together are standing by their values, to protect employees from being fired or discriminated against,” she said.
AP Business Writer Allison Linn in Seattle contributed to this report.
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