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2018 Proxy Season Review

Key statistics and performance ratings from this year's Canadian proxy season.

2018 Proxy Season Review

Over the past year, Broadridge delivered innovative solutions to enhance securityholder engagement and improve the effectiveness of the proxy process. This report details some of the highlights, including cost-savings and other benefits achieved by our clients, marketplace and regulatory insight, and key performance statistics.

Canadian Statistics & Performance Rating

In the past year, Broadridge delivered new and innovative solutions to drive the efficiency of the proxy process and further enhance securityholder engagement. We would like to take this opportunity to share with you some of the highlights of the 2018 proxy season:

  • Broadridge processed 214.6 billion securities, 53.1% of which were voted. That represents an increase of 4% over 2017.
  • Of the 113.8 billion securities voted, 84.3% of those votes were cast electronically through telephone, ProxyEdge®, ProxyVote.com® or Mobile ProxyVote.
  • 52.3% of all packages were eliminated from traditional delivery streams as a result of ProxyEdge, special processing and electronics delivery.
  • Over 4.3 million emails were delivered by more than 50% of Canadian issuers.
  • Broadridge saved our Canadian issuer clients approximately $40.2 million in print and delivery costs and allowed them to deliver proxy communications according to their securityholders’ preference for what materials they receive and how they receive them.

Regulatory Update

In May 2018, Bill C-25 an Act to amend the Canada Business Corporations Act, the Canada Cooperatives Act, the Canada Not-forprofit Corporations Act and the Competitions Act received Royal Assent (now S.C. 2018, c. 28). The ability to allow CBCA corporations to use notice-and-access to distribute proxy circulars under the provincial securities rules will only be effective on a date determined by an order of the federal cabinet. According to Corporations Canada “the notice-and-access regime provides shareholders with sufficient disclosure to support applications for exemptions under both subsection 151(1) and section 156 of the CBCA.” Refer to the Corporations Canada website for more information.

Engage Retail Securityholders

Issuers can now brand the ProxyVote.com voting site and emails to better engage securityholders. New functionality allows issuers to enhance communications with video or multimedia messages or direct investors to the issuer’s investor relations site. The result is more compelling and effective communications, better securityholder engagement and enhanced brand awareness.

Advanced analytics turns historical data about securityholder voting behaviour into actionable insights. Issuers can leverage data to refine strategy, deliver persuasive securityholder communications, define benchmarks, evaluate progress and improve projections.

Virtual Shareholder Meeting

The popularity of virtual shareholder meetings has dramatically increased since it was first offered in 2009. With over nine years conducting VSMs Broadridge has assembled meaningful support material to assist corporate issuers plan and organize their annual meetings.

The Broadridge Virtual Shareholder Meeting (“VSM”) service offers corporate issuers the ability to conduct annual meetings online, via streaming audio or video. It is the only solution of its kind that allows validated registered and beneficial securityholders to fully participate in an online annual meeting. Broadridge’s VSM service features the ability to authenticate securityholders and allows them to ask questions and vote in real-time at the meeting facilitating English and French video and/or audio streams.

Your Satisfaction Drives Our Business

We are pleased to report that over 96% of Canadian issuers were satisfied or very satisfied with the overall service received from Broadridge, based on the responses to this year's Client Satisfaction Survey. We continue to increase our client satisfaction ratings year-over-year and your comments are important to identify opportunities for further improvements. Please email client.relations@broadridge.com if you have any questions or suggestions.

 2018 Proxy Review
Canadian Proxy Season Statistics

2018 Notice and Access Statistics

  • 581 issuers used Notice and Access to deliver proxy materials.
  • Less than 1% of investors requested paper materials after receiving the Notice.
  • 63% of issuers that use Notice and Access have less than 5,000 beneficial owners.
  • Over $20.3 million were saved by issuers using Notice and Access.

2018 Canadian Proxy Season Highlights

  • Total suppressions were 52.3% of accounts processed.
  • $40.2 million in estimated savings to issuers from suppressions.
  • Over 4.3 million emails were delivered by 1,560 issuers.
  • Shares voted electronically represented 84.4% of all shares voted.
Client Satisfaction Survey Highlights

Broadridge Canada

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