Proxy adviser ISS urges vote against Westpac director over tenure at ASX

Proxy adviser Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) has recommended that investors in Australia's Westpac WBC vote against the re-election of director Peter Nash due to his history at the Australian Securities Exchange ASX.

• Nash was appointed as an independent non-executive director of Westpac in 2018 and he is the chairman of the bank's audit committee

• He served on the ASX board for six years until September 2025 and chaired its audit and supervision committee

• He was a partner with KPMG from 1993 until September 2017

• The ASX is under growing scrutiny from regulators over its governance and ability to manage market infrastructure, following a string of outages and a failure to replace its decades-old clearing and settlement platform known as CHESS

• "Concerns are identified under ISS policy regarding failures of governance, board and risk oversight and fiduciary duties identified at ASX Limited where Mr Nash had served as a long-tenured director," ISS said in its report.

• ISS referred to Australia's corporate regulator's suit against the ASX for allegedly misleading statements over the CHESS replacement project in 2022. ASIC said there was a "collective failure by the ASX board and senior executives at the time."

• ISS added that it had corporate governance concerns over Nash’s history with KPMG, as the accounting firm has been Westpac’s auditor since 2024

• Westpac's annual general meeting will be held on December 11

• Westpac did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Reuters