Agreement ramps up governance measures
TheInvestment and Financial Services Association(IFSA) has released an upgraded Standard Investment Management Agreement (SIMA), emphasising the importance of active corporate governance.
The SIMA is a standardised document outlining the agreement between trustees and fund managers for the investment of superannuation and managed investment funds.
“The new SIMA will serve to highlight the important issues regarding shareholder activism in the minds of all trustees during the time that mandates are negotiated,” IFSA chief executive Richard Gilbert says.
IFSA says that its policy is that fund managers should vote on all material resolutions where they have the voting authority, and the group’s own research shows that members are active shareholders and are involved with companies in which they are invested.
Gilbert says the new agreement will require fund managers to provide trustees with their proxy voting policies and report on their voting activities.
“The changes to the SIMA reinforce what has been IFSA’s policy on corporate governance for many years,” Gilbert says.
“While fund managers have been providing this information where requested, the new SIMA should lift the awareness of corporate governance activities by trustees,” he says.
Gilbert says that IFSA has also encouraged its members to disclose their proxy voting policy on their web sites, in order to raise the level of awareness of corporate governance among retail investors.
Recommended for you
With an advice M&A deal taking around six months to enact, two experts have shared their tips on how buyers and sellers can avoid “deal fatigue” and prevent potential deals from collapsing.
Several financial advisers have been shortlisted in the ninth annual Women in Finance Awards 2025, to be held on 14 November.
Digital advice tools are on the rise, but licensees will need to ensure they still meet adviser obligations or potentially risk a class action if clients lose money from a rogue algorithm.
Shaw and Partners has merged with Sydney wealth manager Kennedy Partners Wealth, while Ord Minnett has hired a private wealth adviser from Morgan Stanley.
