Seven out of ten listed companies in Korea held their annual general meetings in late March, showing that the concentration of shareholder meetings during this period persists.
According to the Korea Listed Companies Association and the KOSDAQ Association on Wednesday, an analysis of 2,478 companies with December fiscal year-ends (795 on the main KOSPI market and 1,683 on KOSDAQ) found that 70.6% held their AGMs in late March. This represents an increase from 66.7% last year, indicating that the clustering of meetings during a specific period has intensified.
By date, AGMs were concentrated on March 26 (711 companies), March 31 (593 companies), and March 27 (437 companies). However, 1,199 companies, or 48.4% of the total, held their meetings outside the expected peak dates, up from 39.3% the previous year.
The most common agenda item at this year's AGMs was amendments to articles of incorporation at 2,093 companies, followed by director appointments (1,954 cases) and auditor or audit committee member appointments (1,453 companies). Due to the implementation of the third revision of the Commercial Act, 266 companies submitted and passed proposals on plans to retain or dispose of previously acquired treasury shares.
Among the 1,197 companies that distributed year-end dividends, 394 implemented improved dividend procedures. The number of companies adopting electronic voting and electronic proxy systems rose to 1,608, up from 1,489 last year.
