Funds Continue to Back Corporate Management

Fund companies continued to vote their proxies overwhelmingly in support of management in 2006, supporting 92% of management-sponsored proposals last year but only 37% of shareholder-sponsored proposals, Reuters reports.

This marks a growing trend for fund companies to support management, up from 90% in 2005 and 89% in 2004, according to The Corporate Library, which looked at the voting records of 29 large fund companies.

Even the fund company that voted the least frequently in favor of management’s proposals, Putnam Investments, voted with them 79% of the time. American Funds voted the most often with management—97% of the time.

However, two companies stood out for their support of shareholder-sponsored proposals—Charles Schawb, which voted 75% of the time in support of their ideas, and T. Rowe Price, which voted along those party lines 72% of the time.