欧洲股东联的合会公司治理纲要英文版.pdf

Euroshareholders Corporate Governance Guidelines 2000 What is Euroshareholders? The European Shareholders Group, “Euroshareholders”, is the confederation of European shareholders associations. It was founded in 1990 and is based in Brussels. At present, eight national shareholders associations are members of Euroshareholders. The organisation’s overall task is to represent the interests of individual shareholders in the European Union. The main objectives of Euroshareholders are: • to support harmonisation at the EU level on issues such as minority shareholder protection, trans- parency of the capital markets and cross-border proxy voting; • to enhance shareholder value in European companies; • to support corporate governance issues at the European level. In order to fulfil these objectives, Euroshareholders will regularly deliver opinions about issues concer- ning the shareholder’s position, carry out research and arrange for proxy representation of members at the various national annual general meetings. Introduction to the Euroshareholders Guidelines In the 1990s, corporate governance was discussed in several European countries, as well as outside Europe. Many reports and/or recommendations about it were published at a national level, in which the attention centred upon the shareholder’s position. In April 1999, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) published its general principles on corporate governance. The OECD principles aim at assisting “Member and non- member governments in their efforts to evaluate and improve the legal, institutional and regulatory framework for corporate governance in their countries...”. Euroshareholders guidelines are based upon the same principles, but are more specific and detailed. The Euroshareholders guidelines will – if adopted by companies and/or countries – result in an imp