ESG and the transatlantic divide are the greatest flashpoints between asset managers and asset owners voting by proxy at shareholder meetings, a report from an Oxford-based social venture has revealed.
The research from OxProx, the Proxy Voting Divergence Report, showed that “asset owners show materially greater support for ESG and shareholder-initiated proposals, while asset managers tend to vote with management more consistently across all proposal types”.
OxProx worked with Kaivalya Research to analyse 4.57m vote records from 464 investors headquartered across the United States, United Kingdom, Europe, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
The transatlantic divide was also critical – and, at times, a deciding factor in terms of continuing mandates, noted the report, which builds on research initially conducted by academic Ian Robertson for his Oxford doctoral thesis.
“UK and EU asset owners vote ‘for’ at rates 27.8 to 68.3 percentage points higher than US asset managers across six categories, reflecting fundamentally different stewardship philosophies,” the report said.
“The gap is not merely statistical: several European [asset owners] terminated US manager mandates in 2025, citing voting misalignment as a factor.”
Dustyn Lanz, CEO of OxProx said there was a need for more open discussion about the divide between how asset owners asset managers use their proxy votes.
“We hope more eyes on more data will help to make voting divergence better understood,” he told IPE.
“Ultimately, we hope this data leads to conversations about voting alignment between principals and agents – and ultimately to better stewardship outcomes across the investment landscape,” Lanz added.
