Vanguard Nearly Doubles Eligible Assets in Investor Choice Program with Three New Funds

Vanguard Also Adds Two New Voting Policy Options and the Ability for Retirement Plan Sponsors to Participate

VALLEY FORGE, Pa., Nov. 18, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Vanguard today expanded its Investor Choice pilot program, adding three new funds and two new voting policy options. For the 2025 proxy season, Vanguard Investor Choice will be offered to nearly four million investors, their advisors, and retirement plan sponsors across nearly $250 billion in assets under management*.

Vanguard Investor Choice, which launched in early 2023, empowers individual investors to make their voices heard on important shareholder matters at portfolio companies held in participating Vanguard funds. Investors can choose from a selection of proxy voting policy options that determine how their proportionate fund ownership is voted at shareholder meetings.

“Vanguard Investor Choice is grounded in the foundational belief that empowering investors to influence how their proxies are voted helps create a healthier corporate governance ecosystem,” said John GallowayGlobal Head of Investment Stewardship at Vanguard. “Consistent with our investor-owned**, passive investment approach, we are excited to further expand Investor Choice by adding new funds and policy options, and begin engaging with retirement plan sponsors, so we can ensure that more investors can make their voices heard on proxy voting matters as they seek to achieve their long-term financial goals.”

Participating Funds
For the 2025 proxy season, Vanguard Investor Choice will close to double the asset total from the 2024 pilot, spanning eight Vanguard funds:

• Vanguard S&P 500 Growth Index Fund
• Vanguard Russell 1000 Index Fund
• Vanguard ESG U.S. Stock ETF
• Vanguard Mega Cap Index Fund
• Vanguard Dividend Appreciation Index Fund
• Vanguard High Dividend Yield Index Fund***
• Vanguard Tax-Managed Capital Appreciation Fund***
• Vanguard Tax-Managed Small-Cap Fund***

Retirement Plans
Vanguard Investor Choice will allow retirement plan sponsors that offer eligible funds to consider participating, empowering them to explore providing proxy voting choice to participants in 401(k) and other retirement plans.

New Policy Options

Vanguard Investor Choice provides a spectrum of simple, distinct, and thoughtfully curated voting policy options. For the 2025 proxy season, Vanguard is adding two new policy options that reflect ongoing investor feedback:

• Mirror Voting Policy (replacing the “Not Voting” Policy), which votes an investor’s proportionate shares in approximately the same proportions as the votes cast by other shareholders.
• Third Party Wealth-Focused Policywhich votes an investor’s proportionate shares in accordance with the recommendations from a third-party (Egan-Jones) that focuses on maximizing shareholder value without being influenced by political or social agendas.

The new policy options offer additional choices to investors and expand the range of third-party providers, complementing the existing policy lineup, which includes: the Company Board-Aligned Policy, the Third-Party ESG Policy, and the Vanguard-Advised Funds Policy.

“Guided by our mission and legacy of taking a stand for investors, we are committed to continuing to expand Investor Choice in a thoughtful, straightforward, and efficient way so that more and more investors can make their voices heard,” added Galloway.

For more information about Vanguard Investor Choice, please click here. To learn more about how participating investors voted in the 2024 proxy year, please click here.

About Vanguard

Founded in 1975, Vanguard is one of the world’s leading investment management companies. The firm offers investments, advice, and retirement services to tens of millions of individual investors around the globe—directly, through workplace plans, and through financial intermediaries. Vanguard operates under a unique, investor-owned structure where Vanguard fund shareholders own the funds, which in turn own Vanguard. As such, Vanguard adheres to a simple purpose: To take a stand for all investors, to treat them fairly, and to give them the best chance for investment success. For more information, visit vanguard.com

For more information about Vanguard funds or ETF Shares, contact your financial advisor to obtain a prospectus or, if available, a summary prospectus. Investment objectives, risks, charges, expenses, and other important information are contained in the prospectus; read and consider it carefully before investing.

Vanguard ETF Shares are not redeemable with the issuing Fund other than in very large aggregations worth millions of dollars. Instead, investors must buy and sell Vanguard ETF Shares in the secondary market and hold those shares in a brokerage account. In doing so, the investor may incur brokerage commissions and may pay more than net asset value when buying and receive less than net asset value when selling.

ESG funds are subject to ESG investment risk, which is the chance that the stocks or bonds screened by the index provider or advisor, as applicable, for ESG criteria generally will underperform the market as a whole or, in the aggregate, will trail returns of other funds screened for ESG criteria. The index provider or advisor’s assessment of a company, based on the company’s level of involvement in a particular industry or their own ESG criteria, may differ from that of other funds or an investor’s assessment of such company. As a result, the companies deemed eligible by the index provider or advisor may not reflect the beliefs and values of any particular investor and may not exhibit positive or favorable ESG characteristics. The evaluation of companies for ESG screening or integration is dependent on the timely and accurate reporting of ESG data by the companies. Successful application of the screens will depend on the index provider or advisor’s proper identification and analysis of ESG data. The advisor may not be successful in assessing and identifying companies that have or will have a positive impact or support a given position. In some circumstances, companies could ultimately have a negative or no impact or support of a given position.

The Vanguard Russell 1000 Index Fund and Russell® are registered trademarks of Russell Investments and have been licensed for use by The Vanguard Group, Inc. The Product(s) are not sponsored, endorsed, sold or promoted by Russell Investments and Russell Investments makes no representation regarding the advisability of investing in the Products.

The Vanguard S&P 500 Growth Index Fund is a product of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC, a division of S&P Global, or its affiliates (“SPDJI”), and has been licensed for use by Vanguard. Standard & Poor’s® and S&P® are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor’s Financial Services LLC, a division of S&P Global (“S&P”); Dow Jones® is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC (“Dow Jones”); and these trademarks have been licensed for use by SPDJI and sublicensed for certain purposes by Vanguard. Vanguard S&P 500 Growth Index Fund is not sponsored, endorsed, sold or promoted by SPDJI, Dow Jones, S&P, their respective affiliates, and none of such parties make any representation regarding the advisability of investing in such product(s) nor do they have any liability for any errors, omissions, or interruptions of the Vanguard S&P 500 Growth Index Fund.

All investing is subject to risk, including possible loss of principal.

Vanguard Marketing Corporation, Distributor.

*As of September 30, 2024
**Vanguard is owned by its funds, which are owned by Vanguard’s fund shareholder clients.
***Funds added to Vanguard’s proxy voting pilot program in 2025

SOURCE Vanguard