Increasing proportion of investors based in Germany
From the shareholder identification survey conducted in October 2010, we identified around 76% of the bearer shares in free float held by institutional investors. The survey provides information about the regional distribution of the institutional investors as well as the classification of the respective institutional investor types. As in the previous years, U.S. institutional investors hold the largest proportion of Merck shares in free float. However, the proportion of U.S.-based shareholders declined from 53% in 2009 to 49% in 2010. By contrast, German institutional investors built up significant stakes and now hold 12% of the share capital as compared with 9% in 2009. The United States still ranks well ahead of both the United Kingdom, where 13% of our shares are held, and Germany. The distribution of investors by investment strategy shows a slight increase in the proportion of value- and growth-oriented investors. The proportion of index-oriented investors rose by seven percentage points to 19%.
Identified investors by region
Identified investors by type
As of December 31, 2010, the following shareholders reported their holdings in Merck shares to the company in accordance with the German Securities Trading Act:
5% – 10% Barclays PLC, London (United Kingdom)
5% – 10% BlackRock Inc., New York (USA)
5% – 10% Capital Research and Management Company, Los Angeles (USA)
5% – 10% Sun Life Financial Inc., Toronto (Canada)
5% – 10% Templeton Global Advisors Ltd., Nassau (Bahamas)
3% – 5% Capital World Growth and Income Fund, Inc., Los Angeles (USA)
3% – 5% Deutsche Bank, Frankfurt (Germany)
3% – 5% Fidelity International Ltd., Hamilton (Bermuda)
Nearly 60% of the share capital represented at the Annual General Meeting
At the Annual General Meeting on April 9 in Frankfurt, 37,624,121 out of 64,621,126 outstanding shares were represented. This corresponds to 58.22% of the share capital. With the exception of agenda items 4 and 5, which concerned resolutions on the approval of the actions of the members of the Executive Board and the Supervisory Board and were each passed with 56% of the votes, more than 99% of the votes were in favor of the other five agenda items. Further details can be found on our website.
Numerous Investor Relations activities
In the course of 2010, the Executive Board and the Investor Relations team took part in 13 investor conferences in Frankfurt, London, Los Angeles, Munich, New York, Paris and San Francisco. In addition, company representatives visited investors at the key financial centers in the United States and Europe within the scope of 23 roadshows. International investor groups visited Darmstadt on three dates and equity sales briefings were held with the sales staffs of selected banks on three further dates. A large number of face-to-face meetings were held. For the first time since 2007, we held investor and analyst conferences in London and New York in September. The Executive Board gave detailed presentations of the business and financial strategy of Merck.