I'm a HES shareholder; however I don't own a substantial stake and haven't had time to really care too significantly who wins.
I agree that it doesn’t matter much which side wins (for the reasons set forth in #msg-86520935); however, you might as well vote your shares one way or the other.
What’s good for HES in the long run—i.e. not separating the Bakken assets from the rest of the company—should also be beneficial to the share price in the short run. In other words, the benefit of activist involvement per se is already reflected in the share price and it won’t go away, IMO, if Elliott’s nominees lose.
Sell-side analysts such as the one at Citi would seem to have a conflict of interest here in favoring the outcome (an Elliott win) that is more likely to foster opportunities for IB business.