With the 2025 AGM season now in full swing, companies need to prepare for what trends to expect this year. Divisions are growing between shareholders and boards on topics including diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), environmental, social and governance (ESG), as well as increased scrutiny on big tech.
For example, shareholder resolutions are becoming increasingly divisive, with average levels of support now at an all-time low. While support for shareholder resolutions globally was around 40% in 2021, they have continued to trend downwards, hitting 20.6% last year.
To address this disconnect, companies should look towards facilitating engagement between boards and shareholders, particularly through digital platforms. These platforms can enhance security and transparency throughout the proxy voting process.
Rise of corporate governance
The 2024 AGM season saw a 13% rise in corporate governance-related shareholder proposals. We expect this to continue throughout 2025. In particular, the 2024 AGM season saw an uptick in proposals to replace supermajority voting with simple majority. Around 40 such resolutions were voted on, receiving an average support of 75% from shareholders, indicating strong backing for this.
Furthermore, there has been broad support for proposals for equal shareholder voting rights. During Tyson Foods’ shareholder meeting in February, a proposal was made for the company to report vote outcomes by share class to give more transparency into voting support, which 56% of non-insider shareholders backed.
Simultaneously, shareholder activism is on the rise. Some 243 activist campaigns were launched in 2024, the highest number since 2018. While activist campaigns have historically been primarily in the US, making up 69% of all campaigns in 2025, this dropped to 47% last year.
In 2023, activist campaigns in Europe surged by 68%, and last year, the number of activist campaigns in APAC exceeded Europe for the first time, highlighting the growth of shareholder activism globally.
Early in 2025, Saba Capital launched a bid to control seven UK Investment trusts. It was one of the most most hotly debated examples of shareholder activism this year- so far. It reflected growing investor influence and increased scrutiny of board decisions Corporate responsibility sees global divide.
The outlook for DEI and ESG in shareholder proposals in 2025 is mixed, particularly with support diverging between Europe and the US.
Despite anti-DEI proposals doubling from 6 to 13 from 2023 to 2024, they continue to receive low levels of shareholder support. For example, Costco, Apple and Deere all saw near unanimous (98%) opposition to such resolutions. However, scrutiny on DEI is expected to increase following the DEI backlash.
Proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) indefinitely halted consideration of certain diversity factors in making vote recommendations. BlackRock and Vanguard have also softened the tone of their proxy voting guidelines. They removed numerical targets surrounding board diversity and, language stating that boards should represent diversity, respectively.
Similarly, while anti-ESG proposals quadrupled from 23 in 2021 to 112 in 2024, they have seen average shareholder support fall from 5.1% in 2023 to 2.4% in 2024. The backlash in ESG, as well as scrutiny around ESG investing, means pro-environment and climate proposals are also seeing less traction.
This trend is particularly evident in the US, where the SEC has dropped climate disclosure rules, though investors will continue to demand transparency on climate risk information from companies. Four hundred and fifty financial institutions across the world, managing 40% of global capital, remain committed to net-zero investments.
However, support for ESG resolutions remains high in the UK and Europe, with 81% of shareholder ESG proposals backed on average last year. In contrast to the US, where only 25% of proposals last year were supported.
Big tech comes under fire
With big tech playing an increasingly political role in the US, several of these companies are facing scrutiny on data centre practices, human rights, and, most often, artificial intelligence (AI) ethics. The evolving nature of AI has seen AI-related proposals come to the fore for the first time. Shareholders are concerned about the sustainability of AI, how AI is used, and what safeguards businesses have in place when using AI.
Data centres, in particular, consume significant amounts of energy, and Alphabet and Digital Realty Trust have been questioned as to whether these environmental costs are accounted for in sustainability targets.
These proposals have all seen fair levels of support, with resolutions on ethical considerations of AI receiving support at Netflix (43.3%), Apple (37.5%), and WB Discovery (24%) in 2024.
Digitalisation of proxy voting
As such, investor engagement with companies is becoming more important in this increasingly divisive landscape. 60% of investors have expressed dissatisfaction with current, traditional forms of communication, according to a survey by the investor relations association NIRI. In comparison, 75% of investors prefer digital updates, highlighting the demand for transforming the system.
The digitalisation of the proxy voting system is the key to improving engagement and enhancing transparency and efficiency between investors and companies.
To help understand a company’s shareholder base, technology such as Proxymity’s Shareholder Insights suite provides companies with details of the structure of their shareholder base, including visibility of ownership through the intermediary chain. This means that companies have oversight of trends among investors and the impact of significant business changes on them.
Furthermore, Proxymity’s Vote Connect solution aims to ensure real-time communication between issuers and investors. The platform allows users to send and receive meeting announcements, proxy vote, and track live vote progress. This ensures that companies can more meaningfully engage with their shareholder base, keeping them consistently informed and involved in board decisions.
This AGM season, companies should utilise such platforms to stay abreast of proxy voting trends, and most importantly, ensure their shareholders feel heard.
Proxymity is the leading digital investor communications platform. They connect issuers, intermediaries and investors in real time via their unique digital pathway, providing transparency, efficiency and accuracy throughout the ecosystem.
