May 5, 2025
Dear Fellow Shareholders,
We are writing to provide you with additional information as you prepare to cast your votes at our 2025 Annual Meeting of Shareholders on May 14, 2025. This letter supplements our definitive proxy statement filed by Simon Property Group, Inc. (the “Company”) with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) on April 1, 2025 (the “Proxy Statement”)1.
Institutional Shareholder Services (“ISS”), a proxy advisory firm which is currently majority owned by Deutsche Börse Group, is recommending that shareholders vote against (i) Proposal 2 in our Proxy Statement, which is the “Say-on-Pay Proposal”, (ii) certain members of the Governance and Nominating Committee (the “G&N Committee”) based on a capital structure that has been in existence since 1993 and (iii) Proposal 4 in our Proxy Statement, which is a proposal to redomesticate the Company to the state of its headquarters, Indiana. We note that another prominent proxy advisory service, Glass Lewis, has recommended voting for each of the foregoing matters.
Disappointingly, these misguided recommendations are not inconsistent with other recent, high-profile, controversial recommendations made by ISS, including recently recommending against certain proposals put forth by institutions such as Blackrock, Goldman Sachs and Bank of America, the motivations for which appear to be unrelated to promoting long-term shareholder value. On April 28, 2025, we reached out to ISS, requesting that they correct certain materially misleading statements and assertions contained in their report and, as of today, we have received no substantive response.
The Company has been a strong fiduciary for its stakeholders, producing a ~4,000% total return to shareholders since the 1993 IPO, which stands in direct contrast to ISS, whose ownership has changed multiple times since inception and which is failing its customers by engaging in inadequate or misguided analysis, promulgating arbitrary rules without explanation and the rote application of policies in furtherance of ISS’s “check-the-box”, one-size fits all, governance model.
We believe that the information in this letter, along with the Proxy Statement, will be helpful to you as you cast your vote and again encourage you to vote FOR all proposals, in accordance with recommendations of the Company’s Board of Directors (the “Board’).
Say-on-Pay
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The Company’s Compensation & Human Capital Committee worked closely with consultants, outside advisors and management to create the Amended and Restated Other Platform Investment Incentive Program (the “A&R OPI Program”) based on substantial engagement with, and constructive feedback from, shareholders, which was adopted by the Board in November 2023.
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At the 2024 Annual Meeting of Shareholders, response to the A&R OPI Program was resoundingly positive, with ISS recommending voting “For” Say-on-Pay, including the A&R OPI Program, and 94.3% shareholder support.
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But now, ISS is recommending that shareholders vote “against” the Company’s Say-on-Pay Proposal because an OPI award made pursuant to the A&R OPI Program is too high.