"By succumbing to pressure, the NYSE is almost certainly encouraging such attacks in the future. What happens when the activists turn their attention to … [other] companies listed on the exchange that are in the same business? Or when they decide to target department-store chains that sell furs? And what happens when other activists, seeing SHAC's success, follow in its footsteps?"
— Wall Street Journal Assistant Managing Editor Alan Murray
"If the 'mighty' Big Board can be buffaloed by a handful of puppy-preferring psychos, what happens when other extremists, who think trees and other forms of plant life also have rights, see for themselves that the exchange can be pushed around? If the resulting threats get severe enough, will the Big Board's President Flip-Flop agree to de-list International Paper Co., or perhaps Georgia Pacific?"
— New York Post business writer Christopher Byron
During a September 29, 2005 National Public Radio broadcast, Columbia Business School finance professor Charles Jones called the New York Stock Exchange's last-minute reversal “unprecedented.” He also predicted that once the exchange took its first step down the road of terror-appeasement, “it's going to be very hard to decide where to stop on that path.” — Wall Street Journal Assistant Managing Editor Alan Murray
"If the 'mighty' Big Board can be buffaloed by a handful of puppy-preferring psychos, what happens when other extremists, who think trees and other forms of plant life also have rights, see for themselves that the exchange can be pushed around? If the resulting threats get severe enough, will the Big Board's President Flip-Flop agree to de-list International Paper Co., or perhaps Georgia Pacific?"
— New York Post business writer Christopher Byron
“The stakes in the war against Life Sciences,” adds bio-ethicist Wesley Smith in The Weekly Standard, “are greater than the survival of one company … Today, it is medical testing. Tomorrow it could be the fast food industry, zoos, the salmon fleet. The list is potentially endless. So is the list of potential imitators. Why wouldn't antiwar radicals, having noted SHAC's success, apply tertiary targeting against businesses that contract with the Defense Department?”
Smith and Jones are right. Of the companies that make up the Fortune 50 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average, more than one-third are the subjects of organized anti-business activist campaigns. There's no threat like a bottom-line threat, and now activists need only look to the NYSE for a taste of their future leverage.
Worse yet, eight of these elite corporations are themselves targets of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC), the same group that has already forced the NYSE to cancel one listing. SHAC's overall list of targets (all customers and suppliers of Life Sciences Research International) is over 100 companies long. And dozens of them are publicly traded corporations.
In Line Behind SHAC?
Anti-business activism is alive, well, and as radical as ever. Animal “rights” violence and eco-terrorism are just two of the movement's many bitter flavors. Organized campaigns against the NYSE-traded companies listed below could turn much uglier without warning, if activists embrace the SHAC model of obtaining leverage by pressuring the New York Stock Exchange. Will Wall Street be ready? And will the NYSE continue to roll over?
| Target | Antagonist | Issue |
| Alcoa [NYSE: AA] |
Saving Iceland | Preservation of Icelandic wilderness |
 | ||
| Altria Group [NYSE: MO] |
Corporate Accountability International | Continued mass-marketing of tobacco products |
| ||
| Bank of America [NYSE: BAC] |
Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty | Presumed financial support of Life Science Research International |
| ||
| Coca-Cola [NYSE: CCE] |
The “Killer Coke” Campaign and the Teamsters union | Unionization efforts of Columbian bottling workers |
| ||
| Costco Wholesale [NYSE: COST] |
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society | Seal Oil Capsules |
| ||
| Covance [NYSE: CVD] |
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals | Medical research that requires the use of laboratory animals |
| ||
| ExxonMobil [NYSE: XOM] |
Greenpeace | Global warming |
| ||
| Ford [NYSE: FORD] | Rainforest Action Network | Continued production of fossil fuel-burning vehicles |
| ||
| Forest Laboratories [NYSE: FRW] |
Animal Liberation Front and Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty | Presumed client relationship with Life Sciences Research International |
| ||
| IBM [NYSE: IBM] | Communication Workers of America | Freezing of worker pensions |
| ||
| McDonald's [NYSE: MCD] |
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), Greenpeace, and the Student Labor Action Project | Livestock agriculture; alleged destruction of Amazon rainforests for soy farming; working conditions for tomato farmers |
| ||
| Pfizer [NYSE: PFE] | Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty | Presumed client relationship with Life Sciences Research International |
| ||
| Procter & Gamble [NYSE: PD] |
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and Uncaged Campaigns | Pet-food nutrition studies using live animals |
| ||
| Royal Dutch Shell [NYSE: RDS-B] |
Earth First! | Construction of natural gas pipelines in Ireland |
| ||
| Tyson Foods [NYSE: TSN] |
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals | Methods of chicken slaughter |
| ||
| United Parcel Services [NYSE: UPS] |
Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty | Presumed logistical support of Life Sciences Research International |
| ||
| Wal-Mart [NYSE: WMT] |
United Food & Commercial Workers and the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now | Expansion of healthcare coverage, increases in wages and benefits |
| Wells Fargo [NYSE: WFC] |
Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now and the Rainforest Action Network | Lending practices; financing of oil, coal, logging, and mining operations |
| ||
| Weyerhaeuser [NYSE: WY] |
Rainforest Action Network | Lumber harvesting practices |
| ||
| Yum! Brands [NYSE: YUM] |
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals | Humane treatment of chickens sold to KFC |