More companies adopt electronic voting system in Korea

An office building of the Korea Securities Depository on Yeouido in Seoul / Courtesy of Korea Securities Depository

By Lee Min-hyung

A growing number of companies here are introducing electronic voting systems, as the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in new voting systems for shareholders' meetings.

According to data from the Korea Securities Depository (KSD), a total of 974 firms here used the KSD's electronic voting system ― called K-VOTE ― in their shareholders' meetings in the first three months of this year, up by 15.5 percent from the same period last year.

“This was driven by the spread of non-face-to-face voting after the start of the pandemic in 2020,” an official from the state-run securities depository said.

Demand for electronic voting has also been on the rise for the past few years due to the rise of environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) criteria. The growing importance of implementing ESG values also encouraged more companies to follow the trend.

The number of voting shares of the 974 companies amounted to 54.85 billion, with 5.35 billion of these shares having exercised their voting rights electronically, according to data from the KSD.

With the National Pension Service (NPS) adopting the K-VOTE system, the figure has continued to rise this year, according to the KSD.

More retail investors also exercised their voting rights through the electronic system. According to data from the KSD, more than 300,000 retail investors utilized the K-VOTE system this year, up by around 50 percent from a year earlier.

Last November, the KSD upgraded its K-VOTE system to help more investors exercise their voting rights more easily via its online platform.

The KSD said that it plans to make the system more accessible to more institutional and retail investors by upgrading its platform down the road.

“We will also continue offering benefits to companies that face difficulties holding shareholders' meetings due to the pandemic, without charging them any commission, until the end of this year,” the official said.