#WorkforceWednesday: Return-to-Work Behavior Policies, U.S. Soccer's Landmark Agreement, and Board Diversity in California - Employment Law This Week®
What Does The SEC Approved NASDAQ Diversity Proposal Mean For Boards?
From Distance Meetings to Diversity Reports: 2020 Updates for NY State Businesses
The Importance of Knowing Your Industry and Business Leadership
With the most recent release of their annual review of disclosure regarding women on boards and in executive officer positions at Toronto Stock Exchange-listed issuers, the Canadian Securities Administrators have now...more
In an en banc decision filed on December 11, 2024, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (Fifth Circuit) vacated the 2021 approval by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of rules adopted by The Nasdaq...more
In August 2021, the SEC approved new board diversity rules requiring Nasdaq-listed companies (i) to include a board diversity matrix in their proxy statement or on their website and (ii) to disclose whether they have one...more
On December 11, 2024, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit struck down Nasdaq’s board diversity rules, which were designed to increase representation of women and minorities on corporate boards. Since 2023, the...more
The number of pro-DEI proposals submitted by shareholders decreased overall in the 2024 proxy season compared to the 2023 proxy season, according to data provided by Proxy Analytics. Average support for DEI proposals...more
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit agreed recently to revisit a challenge to Nasdaq's board diversity rule. As we previously reported, a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit upheld the rule in October 2023....more
For two decades, Fenwick has reported on corporate governance statistics and trends among the S&P 100 and Silicon Valley’s top public companies (Fenwick – Bloomberg Law Silicon Valley 150 List), with the goal of educating...more
In Alliance for Fair Board Recruitment v. SEC, a panel of three 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judges upheld Nasdaq’s rules on board diversity. The rules require each Nasdaq-listed company to disclose information on the...more
The intense focus on board diversity from a variety of stakeholders over the last several years has spurred many companies to examine the composition of their boards and to take action to diversify their boardrooms. While the...more
On 13 March 2023, the UK's Parker Review on Ethnic Diversity on UK Boards (the “Review”) published an update report (the "2023 Update") detailing recent progress that has been made in addressing the disparity between levels...more
In August 2021, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved new board diversity listing standards for companies listed on The Nasdaq Stock Market LLC (Nasdaq). As part of these new listing standards, Nasdaq...more
Fenwick has surveyed the corporate governance practices of the companies included in the Standard & Poor’s 100 Index (S&P 100) and the technology and life sciences companies included in the Fenwick – Bloomberg Law Silicon...more
A new study has found that diversity on corporate boards of directors leads to statistically significant increases in the representation of under-represented groups at the manager and staff level. The study – “Do Diverse...more
All Nasdaq-listed companies must now disclose a board diversity matrix by the later of (1) August 8, 2022, or (2) the date the company files its proxy statement for the 2022 annual meeting of shareholders (or, if companies do...more
On 22 February 2022, the UK Government-backed, independent, voluntary and business-led FTSE Women Leaders Review (the “FTSE Women Leaders Review”) published its first report aimed at achieving gender balance across FTSE 350...more
Last month, on May 13, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Maureen Duffy-Lewis ruled that SB 826, which requires publicly held California corporations with a principal executive office in California to follow gender...more
For the second time this spring, a California statute designed to promote diversity in corporate boardrooms was blocked by a state judge. On May 13, 2022, in Crest v. Padilla I (Los Angeles Superior Court Case No....more
Das am 1. Mai 2015 in Kraft getretene Teilhabegesetz verpflichtet Gesellschaften, die börsennotiert sind oder der Mitbestimmung unterliegen sowie Gesellschaften, die börsennotiert und mitbestimmt sind, zur Festlegung von...more
California courts have now struck down the second of the state’s two board diversity laws as unconstitutional. The recent decision affects California's gender diversity requirement for certain boards of directors. In April,...more
Two recent rulings by California state court judges have struck-down California statutes that were intended to foster diversity at California-based public companies. In the first case, Crest v. Padilla, No. 20-STCV-37513...more
On May 13, 2022, Judge Maureen Duffy Lewis of the Superior Court of the State of California for Los Angeles County entered judgement in favor of three taxpayers bringing state constitutional challenges to S.B. 826, a bill for...more
On Friday, May 13, a California Superior Court judge struck down Senate Bill (“SB”) 826—California’s landmark gender diversity law regarding the representation of women directors on the boards of publicly held corporations...more
On May 13, 2022, a judge of the Los Angeles County Superior Court ruled in Crest v. Padilla, Case No. 19STCV27561, that California’s statute requiring California-based public companies to have one to three women on their...more
The California Secretary of State has announced that she has directed counsel to file an appeal of the May 13 verdict of the Los Angeles Superior Court in Crest v. Padilla, which ruled unconstitutional SB 826, California’s...more
In a little over a month’s time, the Superior Court of California (the “Superior Court”) struck down both AB 979 and SB 826, California’s two board diversity statutes. SB 826 required that a public company whose principal...more