Interactive Brokers facilitates proxy voting for eligible client shares based on the firm's net position at the depository as of the record date. This net position reflects aggregated long and short client holdings, along with firm-level stock loans and borrows. Only shares in Interactive Brokers’ possession can be voted. Shares that are unavailable due to lending or other encumbrances are not eligible to be voted.
Record-date shareholders with settled shares eligible to vote should expect to receive shareholder materials with voting and/or meeting attendance instructions. However, being a record-date holder does not automatically determine vote eligibility.
- Margin Account: Margin account clients may lose the right to vote on a portion of or all their shares because of this account type. The margin account may have held settled shares that were not fully paid and segregated over the record-date of the meeting. Please refer to the section titled “IB's Right to Loan/Pledge Customer Assets” in the IBKR Customer Agreement.
- SYEP: SYEP account clients may lose the right to vote on a portion of or all their shares when they are lent out over the record-date of a meeting.
- Cash Account in SYEP: For cash accounts that are participants in the SYEP program, you must un-enroll in the program to ensure your shares are not lent out over the record-date. Please note that you will not be able to re-enroll back into the program for 90 days.
- DRS or Transfer Out: Clients that initiated shares to be transferred out, and that action is over the record-date of a meeting, may lose the right to vote on all or a portion of their shares as a result.
- Cash Account: Shares not lent out over the record-date in a cash account should expect to vote their full shares, however, in limited circumstances, it's possible shares in a cash account may end up not being vote-eligible.
Note
- If you believe that you are entitled to vote more shares than have been reported as eligible to you, please contact your financial advisor, introducing broker or Interactive Brokers Client Services.
- We are committed to providing transparent support for exercising your rights as an investor.