Corporate Governance and Shareholder Activism
In recent years, large, publicly traded American corporations have increasingly faced pressure from a subset of shareholder activists that introduce proposals on the companies’ proxy ballots for consideration at annual meetings. This report draws upon information in the Proxy Monitor database to assess the 2013 proxy season in historic context. Among its key findings:
In recent years, large, publicly traded American corporations have increasingly faced pressure from a subset of shareholder activists that introduce proposals on the companies’ proxy ballots for consideration at annual meetings. This report draws upon information in the Proxy Monitor database to assess the 2013 proxy season in historic context. Among its key findings:
- The number of shareholder proposals introduced is up.
- Support for shareholder proposals is down.
- The overwhelming majority of shareholder proposals are sponsored by a small subset of shareholders.
- The most frequent sponsors of shareholder proposals, labor-union pension funds, could be targeting companies for reasons other than shareholder value, including the companies’ political participation.
- Shareholder proposals related to corporations’ political spending or lobbying constituted a plurality of all proposals in 2013 but continued to attract little support.
Read the full report here.
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