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Relational Investors, an investment group that has claimed a couple of CEO scalps, plans to sharply cut its holdings in Intuit where it has been very quiet. The firm has informed Intuit that it will sell up to 5,562,500 shares of stock, almost 50 percent of its holdings as reported to the SEC on June 21. Relational expressed its confidence in Intuit and its future.

Relational purchased its shares two years ago and forced its way onto the board by threatening a proxy fight. One of the firm's partners, David H. Batchelder, has served as an Intuit board member since late in 2009. Relational's other partner, Ralph Whitworth, is considered an expert in corporate governance and has reportedly gone after companies that he considers are being dominated by their CEOs and not performing well.

The firm has not disclosed the reason for the original investment in Intuit, and its filing with the SEC, outside of complimenting Intuit, said only that it was seeking to diversity its holdings. Other than mentioning two years ago that Relational and Intuit had common goals, Intuit CEO Brad Smith has not mentioned the investment group and any impact it has had has not been made public.

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