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Korea’s 2024 shareholders’ meeting season was marked by several high-profile activist movements — from minor shareholders’ thwarted campaign against Samsung C&T to the partial victory of local investor Align Partners over JB Financial Group.<\/p>\nKorea’s 2024 shareholders’ meeting season was marked by several high-profile activist movements — from minor shareholders’ thwarted campaign against Samsung C&T to the partial victory of local investor Align Partners over JB Financial Group.<\/p>\n
Such a trend, according to Julie Rhee, managing director of New Jersey-based ³ÉÈËÊÓƵ, highlights the growing need for market players to ramp up their stakeholder engagement<\/a> efforts around the yearly clock.<\/p>\n Companies, as well as activist funds, “need to be putting their rationale forward early on and making their viewpoints understood,” the corporate governance<\/a> veteran said.<\/p>\n It’s becoming more and more critical that companies start dialogue and prepare earlier,” stressed Rhee, adding that “the common factor in every single project is always that a lot of times, so many things can be avoided had there been dialogue before certain blackout periods.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Rhee, based in Hong Kong, is a managing director handling Alliance Advisor’s business expansion and client relationships in the Asia-Pacific region, with 16 years of capital market experience and expertise in environmental, social and governance (ESG). Before joining Alliance in 2022, Rhee led the Issuer Solutions business for S&P Global’s Korean operation.<\/p>\n Alliance Advisor is a U.S. corporate governance advisory<\/a> firm with some 1,000 clients worldwide. In 2023, its first year in the Korean market, the firm provided services to firms including KT&G, Posco Holdings, KB Financial Group and Hana Financial Group during the annual shareholder meeting season. Clients also include shareholder activist funds, as the firm provided engagement support for Align Partners’ campaign against JB Financial Group in 2023.<\/p>\n More recently, Alliance supported LG’s annual meeting this year and provided proxy adviser support to OCI Holdings<\/p>\n “We view Korea as a hot market, certainly, and that’s not just because Korea is unique in that way, but [due to] an overall environmental situation,” noted Rhee.<\/p>\n Proxy adviser policy is getting more and more stringent,” said the managing director, who also cited hiked ESG risks and a steady rise in shareholder activism<\/a> in the Asia-Pacific region as some of the latest systemic shifts.<\/p>\n Activism is increasingly becoming more prevalent in the overall Asian region, and we’ve seen a huge spike in Korea starting 2023 — and 2024 was even more active.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Though cases where shareholder activist funds achieve the majority vote at an annual shareholders’ meeting are rare, growing demand from the sector continues pressuring companies to better persuade investors and other stakeholders.<\/p>\n