The Korea Securities Depository (KSD) has discussed ways to improve the voting rights support system for investors in U.S. stocks in collaboration with Citibank. The aim is to examine the legal relationships and ownership structures of domestic investors holding U.S. stocks and to seek effective measures for exercising shareholder rights.
KSD announced that it co-hosted a seminar titled 'Legal Status and Shareholder Rights of U.S. Listed Securities Holders' with Citibank in Busan the previous day.
About 60 participants attended the seminar, including representatives from Broadridge, a proxy voting agency, and foreign securities departments from 11 brokerage firms.
In the first part of the seminar, a research team from Seoul National University's Industry-Academic Cooperation Foundation presented key findings from their study on the legal status and rights of U.S. listed securities holders. The researchers emphasized the need to comprehensively review domestic laws, custody agreements between KSD and Citibank, and U.S. state laws, given the multi-tiered ownership structure of domestic investors' U.S. stocks.
The second part featured discussions among brokerage firms, KSD, Broadridge, and legal experts on improving the voting rights support system and addressing legal issues. Samsung Securities highlighted the current status and practical need for improvements in the voting rights exercise for foreign securities, while KSD introduced the improvement directions it is reviewing based on the researchers' proposals. Broadridge explained service models that could support the related improvements.
Yoon Soo, President of KSD, expressed hope that the seminar would facilitate smooth communication among relevant agencies and market participants, leading to effective improvement measures for supporting voting rights for U.S. stocks.
David Brown, Head of Investor Services for Citibank's Japan, North Asia, and Australia (JANA), emphasized that exercising voting rights for U.S. stocks is a key element in protecting investors and enhancing trust in capital markets. He expressed his commitment to collaborating with relevant agencies and market participants to contribute to the development of improvement measures.
KSD plans to concretize institutional and practical improvement measures for the voting rights support system for foreign securities based on the discussions and feedback from market participants during the seminar.
* This article has been translated by AI.
Copyright ⓒ Aju Press All rights reserved.