Investors Get 1st Look at Fund Firms’ Proxy Votes
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U.S. mutual fund companies this week gave investors their first-ever look at proxy voting records, illustrating efforts to remove certain corporate chiefs and scuttle some pay packages.
Vanguard Group, for example, withheld its votes for Sumner Redstone, chairman and chief executive of Viacom Inc., and his daughter, Shari, as directors at his media empire.
The reams of data offer insight into some of the fiercest boardroom battles, such as the effort to oust Michael Eisner from Walt Disney Co.’s board.
Fidelity Investments’ flagship Magellan stock fund, with $62.4 billion in assets, voted to withhold votes for the entire Disney board, including Eisner.
Putnam Investments’ Voyager fund voted against Eisner but voted for the rest of the board. Vanguard voted for all 11 directors at Burbank-based Disney but abstained from voting on proposals relating to labor standards in China.
Vanguard said that in general, it withheld votes for directors who failed to attend three-quarters of board or committee meetings, were deemed nonindependent or who served on boards that awarded excessive compensation, for example.
The vote disclosures were ordered by the Securities and Exchange Commission as part of its mutual fund reform efforts.
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