On Wednesday 7 December, the EU institutions reached agreement on the shareholder rights directive. MEPs are using this draft legislation as their hobby horse in the interinstitutional talks on public country-by-country reporting. They have now agreed to withdraw mentions of this from the directive.
Basically, Parliament made its negotiating position the non-withdrawal of these measures from the draft directive until progress was made on reporting in other items of draft legislation and the directive on accounting standards. The European Commission agreed to propose public reporting in the accounting standards directive in April and Parliament relented.
The final agreement foresees that companies quoted on the stock exchange will have the right to identify their shareholders. The member states may, however, stipulate that only shareholders with a certain percentage of shares or voting rights should be identified if this threshold is below 0.5%.
The final compromise confirms the Commission’s initial idea that shareholders should vote on the company’s pay policy (have a ‘say on pay’). The pay of directors would be published and kept public for ten years, as would developments in directors’ pay compared with the pay of workers and the company’s performance.
Greater transparency requirements will be introduced for institutional investors’ investment strategies. The Council and Parliament need to approve this interinstitutional agreement. (Original version in French by Élodie Lamer)