KEY TAKEAWAYS

• 2026 is shaping up to be the strongest Say-on-Pay (SOP) season in recent history. Average S&P 500 SOP support reached 90.3%, the only time above 90% in the past 5 years.
• Low support is less prevalent. Only 5% of companies received less than 70% support in 2026, down from 11% in 2022.
• Strong S&P 500 total shareholder return (TSR) coincided with favorable SOP results. Since 2024, SOP failures have remained at 1% of S&P 500 proposals while one-, three-, and five-year TSR results were strongly positive.
• Influence of proxy advisor SOP opposition continues to deteriorate. Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) opposition declined to 9% year-over-year, while Glass Lewis (GL) opposition increased slightly to 13%. When both proxy advisors opposed SOP this season, only 19% failed to receive majority shareholder support, down from 50% in 2022.
• The “big five” investors continue to take a selective approach to opposing S&P 500 SOP proposals and rely heavily on their proprietary voting frameworks. Top asset managers supported SOP at a rate of 95.6% in 2026 and deviated from proxy advisor SOP opposition in an overwhelming majority of cases.
• As the proxy voting landscape continues to evolve, understanding investor expectations and effectively communicating rationale for compensation decisions is critical to strengthening SOP support.

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