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- Number of environmental & social (E&S) shareholder proposals filed and on ballot declined sharply. As of June 30, 2026, 275 E&S proposals were submitted to US companies, about a 43 percent decrease from the 482 that had been submitted by around the same time in 2025. After withdrawals and omissions, 162 proposals got on ballot, down from 239 at the same time last year, which constituted about a 32 percent decrease.
- SEC’s suspension of guidance on no action requests propelled proponents to engage in private negotiations with companies, leading to fewer public filings of E&S shareholder resolutions. Other factors for the drop in submissions may include the current political environment, the evolving regulatory landscape, a multi-year decline in shareholder support of E&S proposals, and improved disclosures by many of the S&P 500 companies that have historically been the most likely to receive shareholder proposals.
- Average support for E&S proposals continued to decline. Support for environmental and social proposals continued to decrease, likely driven by the prescriptiveness of some proposals, the rising number of anti-ESG proposals, the politicization of “ESG,” and improvements in company disclosures. There were no majority-supported E&S proposals as of June 30th, down from five the previous year and continuing the overall decline of the last five years.
- For the second consecutive year, “anti-ESG” shareholder proposals were the most filed type of E&S proposal. As of June 30th, 87 such proposals were filed and 59 made it onto ballots, down from the 119 filed and 66 on ballot at this time last year. As in the past, these proposals tended to question the value of traditional ESG considerations, and received low support levels overall.
- Among pro-E&S shareholder proposals, climate change was the most common proposal topic appearing on ballots, and political spending resolutions received the highest average shareholder support. Other key proposal topics included human rights, artificial intelligence, and various other environmental issues, such as plastics waste and biodiversity loss.
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Authored By
Enver Fitch
Noelle Carpenter
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