"...what is stopping Spider on insisting on and actually going ahead with a RS?"
There was a very spirited discussion in May and June 2008 with regards to the 1:10 RS proposal put forward prior to the 2008 SPQ AGM in June. The SPQ Board of Directors made this proposal believing that potential institutional investors would like to see a stronger share price. (I believe that SPQ was trading around 8 cents at the time. A full 1:10 RS would have pegged the new share price at 80 cents.)
Since any such proposal must be put before the AGM, it must be voted on. In the case of this RS proposal, the larger body of retail shareholders banded together and voted it down.
Whether an investor agrees or disagrees with such proposals makes for a lively discussion; but the point here is that in order for the BOD to insist on such a proposal, they must garner enough votes (1 share = 1 vote) to do so.
Snug