January 10, 2022
End-to-End Vote Confirmation Coming this Proxy Season
The January 5, 2022 issue of the Society for Corporate Governance’s weekly “Society Alert” noted that the Operations Subcommittee of the End-to-End Vote Confirmation Working Group announced that it has agreed to provide vote confirmation this proxy season for Fortune 500 annual meetings that are tabulated by members of the Operations Subcommittee and to pilot an early stage vote entitlement reconciliation process for 20 Fortune 500 meetings.
End-to-end vote confirmation is the affirmation to a nominee from the tabulator (and to the nominee’s beneficial owner by the bank or broker) that the vote made was counted as cast. Vote entitlement refers to bank’s or broker’s voting entitlement on behalf of their clients.
The End-to-End Vote Confirmation Working Group came together following the SEC’s November 2018 Roundtable on the Proxy Process, and the Operations Subcommittee consists of virtual shareholder meeting providers, PSPs, tabulators, and representatives from issuers, investors, brokers and banks. These efforts seek to minimize last minute rejections/corrections of shareholder voting and thereby improve the voting process. For more information on these matters, take a look at Mediant’s Industry Collaboration on VSM Access Bodes Well for Achieving End-to-End Vote Confirmation and Broadridge’s The Path to End‐to‐End Vote Confirmation.
– Dave Lynn