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Institutional investors and shareholder engagement: The Fonds Desjardins
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Michel Coulmont 
, Sylvie Berthelot
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Abstract
Following in the footsteps of the celebrated California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS), more and more institutional investors are developing policies governing their proxy voting rights at annual general meetings to clearly express shareholders’ interest in environmental, social, and corporate governance issues. They are also increasingly numerous in promoting responsible investment practices through these policies. The object of this study is to examine the extent to which votes cast by the Fonds Desjardins, a major Canadian institutional investor, at the annual general meetings of firms in which it invests comply with its proxy voting rights policy and its public commitment to the social responsibility of these firms. The analyses were based on the votes recorded on the Fonds Desjardins website from July 1, 2018, to June 30, 2019. Of the 168 votes analysed, 35 did not comply with the Fonds’ policy, reflecting a non-compliance rate of 20.8%. The analyses show that votes on environmental issues are the most diverged from the institution’s policy during the period under study. Overall, the results indicate that the votes cast by the Fonds Desjardins at annual general meetings do not always correspond to the Fonds’ proxy voting rights policy. These findings raise questions about the real motivation behind such policies. Are they a genuine or a symbolic tool?
Keywords: Shareholder Engagement, Shareholder Social Activism, Voting Policy, Annual General Meeting, Institutional Investors
Authors’ individual contribution: Conceptualization — M.C. and S.B.; Methodology — M.C.; Formal Analysis — M.C.; Resources — S.B.; Writing — S.B.; Supervision — M.C.
Declaration of conflicting interests: The Authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.
JEL Classification: M14, G32, G34
Received: 28.09.2023
Accepted: 20.12.2023
Published online: 29.12.2023
How to cite this paper: Coulmont, M., & Berthelot, S. (2023). Institutional investors and shareholder engagement: The Fonds Desjardins. Corporate Ownership & Control, 20(4), 147–154. https://doi.org/10.22495/cocv20i4art10
