Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the 94th Annual General Meeting of Australian Foundation Investment Company. The company secretary has confirmed that a quorum is present, and I'll now open the meeting. I'd like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners and custodians from all the lands we're gathered on today and pay my respects to their elders, past, present, and emerging. We're all very pleased to be able to meet physically with our shareholders after a three-year gap due to the COVID restrictions. In addition, some of the skills we learned during COVID lockdowns now allow us to welcome our shareholders in other parts of Australia and the world alongside the physical meeting. As many of you know, my name is John Paterson. I'm chairman of your company. May I introduce the people on stage with me.
The third across is our Managing Director, Mark Freeman, and alongside him on his left are fellow directors Rebecca Dee-Bradbury, Craig Drummond, Julie Fahey, Graeme Liebelt, David Peever, Cathy Walter, and Peter Williams. We also have our Company Secretary, Matthew Rowe, our Chief Financial Officer, Andrew Porter, and our General Manager of business development and investor relations, Geoff Driver.
Good morning.
In due course, we'll be hearing from the portfolio manager, David Grace, and investment analyst, Nga Lucas. We're also joined by other members of the investment team in the front row of the audience. I'll also take this opportunity to introduce Nadia Carlin, partner of the company's auditors, PricewaterhouseCoopers, who is available to answer questions today on the audit and preparation and content of the auditor's report at the end of the presentation. Nadia has been our audit engagement partner for five years, and as per legal requirements, this is her last AGM as our engagement partner. We thank her for assistance over the years. Before we get to the formal proceedings, I'd like to say a few comments about Peter Williams, who retires as a director at the conclusion of the AGM, having served the board since February 2010.
Peter has been Chairman of the audit committee and a member of these investment and nomination committees. He's also the non-executive Chairman of the company's subsidiary, Australian Investment Company Services Limited. He's played a significant role in providing oversight of the company's growth and development. His contribution to board and investment committee deliberations will be missed, and we thank him for his years of valued service to shareholders and wish him well for the future. Thank you, Peter. Today's meeting is being held as a hybrid meeting, and the presentation has been released to the ASX and made available on the company website. I will remind shareholders using the online platform that while questions can be submitted at any time, I'll not address them until the relevant time in the meeting. To ask a question, select the Q&A icon, type your question into the text box.
Once you've finished typing, please hit the send button. Please also note that your questions may be moderated, or if we receive multiple questions on one topic, amalgamated together. To cast your vote, simply select one of the options. There is no need to hit a submit or enter button, as the vote is automatically recorded. You'll receive a vote confirmation notification on your screen. I now declare voting open on all items of business, and I'll give you a warning before I move to close voting. Before we move to the business of the meeting, I'd like to just provide some additional comments. As we've seen on a number of occasions in recent years, markets have produced surprises at a time when investors were contemplating the possibility of plain sailing, in this case, post the COVID disruptions.
For the first time in many decades, we're experiencing sharply rising inflation, which is exacerbating the effects of the central banks to normalize interest rates. We know that some of the effect of high oil prices, high food prices, and supply chain disruption will wash through, and we may see lower inflation numbers 12 months out, but the level at which inflation stabilizes will be a major driver of where interest rates ultimately settle. This is currently a complete unknown at present. Your chairman started his career in the 1970s when inflation took off, and it was sustained for most of that decade in the 1980s. He's one of the few who have experienced this phenomenon. There are a few observations one can make.
The period of inflation acceleration alongside rising interest rates is particularly disruptive, as there can be lags for companies in recouping cost increases in their pricing, and valuation downgrades are very uncertain because the ultimate level of interest rates is unknown. The attributes one wishes to see in successful equity investments in this environment are companies with low debt, strong market positions which give them pricing power, and quality executives and boards who are adaptable in an uncertain and changing business environment. We believe these characteristics are evident in many of our investments. Once inflation stabilizes, investing in good companies becomes the best defense against the corrosive effects of inflation on wealth. Moving on to the business of the meeting, I'll take the notice of the meeting as read.
With regard to the minutes of the 93rd annual general meeting, they've been signed as a correct record and are available to shareholders for inspection today. The first agenda item is the consideration of the financial statements and reports for the year ended 30th of June, 2022. We'll do this via a presentation after which I will ask shareholders to comment or to raise any questions, either about the presentation or of the auditors if they have any questions about the audit. I'll now pass you to our Managing Director, Mark Freeman.
Well, good morning, everyone, and it's great to be back, meeting face-to-face with our shareholders, investors and owners of the company. Certainly we haven't enjoyed the last couple of years not having exposure to shareholders. It's a really important part of our process and our culture is to have a strong understanding of our shareholders, who they are, what they're looking for from investments. It's important that our board, team, and investment team, all members of our staff, connect with shareholders. They're all here, so I'd encourage you to hang around afterwards, introduce yourself, ask them any questions you want. It's an important part of our accountability to you as the owners of the company. Just starting with the disclaimer. It's just to state that we're here to talk about what we're doing in the business. We're not giving any advice.
We might move to the next slide. Just to the agenda. I'll just have a couple of comments on our investment objectives, then I'll pass to Andrew Porter, our CFO, to talk about the financial results. David Grace and Nga Lucas will talk then about the markets and the portfolio. I'll come back at the end to give some outlook comments. Just to reiterate our simple investment objectives. We're aiming to provide shareholders with attractive investment returns through access to a growing stream of fully franked dividends. We understand how important dividends are to our shareholders and also for growth in capital. We are trying to pay dividends which over time, over the long time, grow faster than inflation, and therefore to provide attractive total returns over the medium to long term. Just a snapshot of the investment team.
As I said, they're all here. It's an experienced team. They're passionate about what they do, they're passionate about the shareholders, and passionate about the process we have for investing in quality companies, and that's always been our approach. Once again, I would encourage you to meet with them afterwards. With those couple of brief comments, I'll pass over to Andrew Porter, our CFO, to talk about the results, but then I'll be back at the end to, as I said, discuss some of the outlook comments.
Thank you, Mark, and I echo the comments that you've already heard. It is very pleasant indeed to be back doing these meetings face-to-face, and I hope that those joining online find it useful. Going to the first slide here, it says that profit was up 54% to just under AUD 361 million. Now appearances can be deceptive. That is indeed the accounting profit, but that included a AUD 75 million merger dividend, which was non-cash from the BHP Petroleum and Woodside merger. Excluding this and excluding the AUD 36.5 million demerger dividend resulting from the Endeavour demerger from Woolworths last year, the real or underlying figure was AUD 286 million or AUD 0.233 per share. That was up 44% from AUD 199 million or AUD 0.163 last year.
Both last year and this year, the earnings were below the dividend that was paid out, and I'll come to dividends later. Share price return was essentially flat over the year, including the dividend. With the market having fallen in the year, the premium in the share price above the net assets of the company increased. Again, I'll come to that later. David and Nga will look at more updated portfolio performance figures later, so I'll move on to the MER or management expense ratio, which is the cost of running the company divided by the average portfolio value. That's the figure in the on the right-hand column, the second figure down. This means that it costs AUD 0.16 for every AUD 100 that you have invested in the company.
The MER has gone up during the year, and there are a number of reasons for that I'll briefly touch on. Taking the numerator first, the expenses did go up. We highlighted a small part of that reason last year, namely that this is the first full year that we've been working on the international portfolio, of which, there will be more later. The other reason is that incentives for the investment team and the executives are, as one would expect, tied to investment performance. Investment performance in the previous year, 2021, was very good. Consequently, incentives were paid and there was little in the way of write-back in the current 2022 year. The incentive expenses essentially lag a year. 2022 performance, while good, was not as good, so there will be more of a write-back in this year, the year ending 2023.
I should probably remind direct shareholders that the remuneration expenses that one sees in the remuneration report, they are what executives receive, but AFIC shareholders only pay a portion, slightly over 50% of that cost, and it's important to bear that in mind. In answer to a question that we've been asked in writing, seven employees who do not participate in these executive schemes participate in the employee share acquisition plan, so they are AFIC shareholders too. Going back to the MER, when the company does well, the expenses will go up. Oh, answering another question, AFIC does not make political or indeed charitable donations. We believe those decisions should be left to the shareholder. A further reminder, there is no external management structure. The services company, which employs all of us, is owned by AFIC and to a lesser extent, Djerriwarrh.
There is no outside company earning profits from running your company. The cost is simply what it costs without a profit element. On the denominator side of the MER, the value of the portfolio went down over the year, as shown in the last figure on the slide. Even if expenses had stayed flat, if the value of the portfolio goes down, the MER goes up. That's simply the way the calculation works. The MER this year will be very dependent on what the market does. I'm happy to take questions on any of that, either at the end of the presentations or afterwards over coffee. If we move on to the next slide, which is the dividends. This slide shows AFIC's earnings and dividend history over the last five years.
One of the advantages of an LIC is its ability to create reserves to pay dividends when times are tough. You'll note that in each of these five years, ordinary or underlying earnings were below the dividend paid. In other words, we were effectively using reserves to fund those dividends. If you had been invested in a trust with the same sort of holdings as AFIC, you would have seen a fall in your dividend income from 2018 to 2019 to 2020 and to 2021. Many companies that we invest in did cut their dividends in 2020 and 2021, as did some other LICs. AFIC did not. It was able to maintain its dividend.
This is important as other companies have now started to reverse those cuts, so their dividends are increasing, and people forget that they are increasing from a lower base because of that cut. AFIC did not. We know how important dividends and franking credits are to shareholders, which is why we maintained them when the going was tough. We are often asked what the franking reserves are if we are going into tougher times. After the payment of the most recent final dividend, as per the annual report, AFIC had roughly AUD 0.37 worth of franked dividend that could be paid using our reserve of franking credits. We are well-placed. With regard to any increase, as the chairman has noted, the board and management, and as Mark has, are well aware that inflation is on the rise.
The board will look at upcoming and forecast results and make a decision at the appropriate time. I should add that they are also very conscious of the expressed intention to bring the interim dividend payment closer to the amount of the final dividend payment. We have been asked in writing a couple of questions about the dividend other than those that I have hopefully answered above. Some have been about how to get the dividend yield up. Well, there are two ways to do that. One is to increase the dividend payment, and I've touched on that. The other is to have a lower share price, and I'm afraid that has been happening with the market falls as well.
I should note, though, that for an LIC, the yield should really be measured against the NTA, not the share price, because that represents the assets upon which we can earn a dividend. We had a related question about why the AFIC dividend is lower than the Argo dividend. Apart from different holdings, et cetera, I would note that whilst AFIC is trading closer to AUD 7 and Argo closer to AUD 9, for a roughly equivalent yield, Argo will have to pay a larger dividend. But importantly, we cannot give any forecast about dividends or the AFIC share price, or in fact, even the Argo ones for that matter. Moving on to the premium discount chart.
We always like to highlight this so shareholders or potential shareholders have some idea about whether they are buying 90 cents worth of assets for a dollar or a dollar worth of assets for 90 cents. As I noted earlier, the relatively strong and stable price, as share price, has led to the premium continuing and increasing, although it has come off its highs. I'm sure many longstanding shareholders are well aware that this can reverse. With that, I'll hand over to David and Nga.
Thank you very much, Andrew, and good morning, everybody. Today, I'll talk to you about current portfolio positioning and our view of current market conditions that companies are facing in their operations. Then I'll hand over to Nga to talk about recent activity in the portfolio in terms of transactions that we've undertaken in the last few months, as well as from insights from our recent U.S. trip. Both of us will be available to answer any questions you have at the conclusion of the presentation. Before we do, just a recap of our investment process. We're long-term investors in quality companies. We're not looking to trade short-term moves in share prices or pick the next cycle within markets.
We focus our research effort on developing a deep understanding of a company's key characteristics, specifically the attributes we believe that will enable a business to deliver earnings growth for many years to come. We want companies that have a strong industry position, run by strong management teams and boards, have sustainable business models over the long term, hold unique, difficult to replicate assets, have a definable competitive advantage, and importantly, maintain a strong balance sheet in generating free cash flow. It is this free cash flow enables a business to reinvest back in for future growth projects. We want to be able to identify these companies and buy when they represent value.
As long-term holders, we seek to benefit from the value that compounding returns provide to shareholders, and we're happy to be patient in only buying when we perceive value with our long-term view of the growth prospects of a company. As long-term investors, the sustainability of any business model is critical to our definition of quality, but also the returns that we can expect to receive. ESG matters are not the complete picture, but are one of the inputs that form part of our investment considerations. We regularly review a company's alignment with our investment process and look to engage with company boards and management where we have concerns. While we take input from proxy advisors, we independently vote on all company resolutions, seeking alignment with our shareholders' interests.
We recognize that all ESG matters remain fluid, with companies constantly updating the market on new information when it comes to hand. We look to review this information and incorporate that as we see fit. Moving on to the next slide, which just shows the relative performance of the portfolio versus the ASX 200 over various time periods. Following a very strong period of performance from FY 2019 to FY 2021, both the three-year and the five-year performance are ahead of the ASX 200 over those periods. However, the last 12 months has been more challenging. Including franking for the 12 months ended August, the portfolio declined 6%, while the ASX 200 delivered a return of -2.1%.
Returns for the portfolio are after tax and expenses, and this was particularly important in the last twelve months, given the takeover of long-held investments in Milton Corporation and Sydney Airport, which had been in the portfolio for a considerable amount of time. The chart on the right-hand side shows the market performance by sector over the last twelve months. Energy and utilities were the best performing sectors, with energy up 53%, largely driven by the conflict in Ukraine, which saw a large spike in both oil and LNG prices. Additionally, we saw a large jump in the coal price, with many coal companies up over 100%, in some cases 200% over the last twelve months. We don't own any pure play coal companies within the portfolio. Both of these sectors are highly cyclical and trade around commodity prices.
It's not our expectation that they'll have the same jump in performance for the next 12 months. Portfolio performance was additionally weighed down by our overweights to the industrials and the healthcare sector. The industrial sector was down 7%. Our largest holding is Transurban, which has seen a return to traffic post-COVID, with both Brisbane and Sydney markets now back at pre-COVID levels and Melbourne not far behind. We feel really comfortable in the long-term prospects for this company and we've used the opportunity to add to our holding over the last 12 months. Similarly in healthcare, our largest overweights are in CSL, Fisher & Paykel, and ResMed. All these businesses hold market leadership positions, all generate significant amounts of free cash flow, and all are investing back into their business, delivering higher returns for shareholders.
We added to all of those companies over the last 12 months, given the short-term share price pullback. The only other point to note on this slide is the information technology sector, which had a really strong run in calendar year 2021, driven really by the falling bond yields at the time, and a lot of that performance has come back this year with the sector trading down 35%. While not a large part of the portfolio, the companies we own within this sector were also impacted. Moving on to slide 17, which just outlines how we're managing the portfolio as we look to own a diversified portfolio of quality companies that are able to perform in a variety of economic settings.
We're not looking to predict economic outcomes, but seek to own companies that provide appropriate diversification, not only by the industry sector that they operate in, but also in the attributes that they bring to the portfolio. We want a mix of growth companies at the top left-hand corner. These are companies that hold market leadership positions, where long-term prospects remain strong. For example, CSL and realestate.com.au, both market leaders within their respective industries, and both have a long history of management being able to redeploy capital at higher rates of return, well above the cost of capital, so adding material shareholder value. Moving to the right-hand side is the stalwart companies owning difficult-to-replicate strategic assets, which are also well-positioned to deliver earnings growth. We classify Transurban, Wesfarmers, the owner of Bunnings, Auckland Airport, and Woolworths within this category.
We want a mix of income stocks, as we recognize that income represents a meaningful contribution to total shareholder return, and the banks and Telstra provide that role for the portfolio. On the bottom left-hand side, cyclicals. These are companies clearly by nature. Their earnings are pegged to the cyclical or part of the cycle. We're looking for really strong balance sheets as we recognize that cycles move up and down. In the resources sector, we own BHP and Rio Tinto. Both operate long life, tier one, low cost assets, and even at the low point of the iron ore cycle, are able to generate cashflow to furnish shareholders with a dividend, but also to reinvest back into their asset base. We classify both Santos and Woodside as cyclical companies. Both companies primarily produce LNG.
This is a critical transition fuel as the world's energy needs move towards renewable sources. However, this transition remains many years away. Both Santos and Woodside have committed to meaningfully reducing their carbon emissions, and it is our view that these assets are best held in the hands of responsible owners with stated plans to decarbonize. We remain holders of both of these companies, and we're keeping a close eye on how the energy transition evolves over the next five-10 years. On to slide 18, which is a snapshot of current equity market conditions as we see them. At the moment, equity markets are facing challenges on a number of different fronts.
There's always challenges at certain levels from a macroeconomic environment, and this is not an exhaustive list, but as we see them, inflation and rise in interest rates with central banks raising rates, slowing consumer spending, softening economic growth in China, the escalating war in Ukraine, and the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, particularly as applies to China, with large parts of the population still in lockdown. With so much uncertainty, investor sentiment becomes very short term. Share prices are now very much trading on the news of the day. While we don't know how all the current issues get resolved, we remain committed to holding a diversified portfolio of quality companies over the long term. Uncertain times provide opportunities to buy our preferred companies at attractive prices. On an upcoming slide, now we'll talk to recent changes we've made to the portfolio.
We wanna stress the balance sheets of all the companies in the portfolio remain in very strong shape. This slide here just shows a high-level metric of price to book and price to sales, just showing valuation of the market over the last 20 years. As you can see at the end of calendar year 2021, on both metrics, equity markets were very fully priced. At the time, interest rates were falling and economic growth remained strong. Following the pullback in the market this year, both measures are now closer to the long-term average, with price to book slightly below and price to sales quickly getting there. The key takeaway is the starting point on valuation is more in line today with the long-term averages.
However, we're conscious of the fact that companies have benefited from handouts during COVID and economic growth is set to slow, so earnings growth is set to become more challenged. As I mentioned, we're finding selective opportunities to add to our preferred holdings. This slide just extends that further to show the real long-term trend within equity markets. It shows the All Ordinaries over the last 80 years and showing the general trend in market performance from the bottom left to the top right-hand corner. Over the period, despite world wars, stock market crashes, the GFC, and the onset of COVID, the All Ords has delivered an average return of just under 6% per annum, pre-dividends. The chart shows sharp pullbacks in equity markets are not uncommon, and when they do occur, markets quickly recover.
We take comfort that over the very long term, equity markets deliver positive returns for shareholders. As history shows, buying in times of bad news delivers good returns for long-term shareholders. Recapping, we wanna be holders of quality companies that own strategic assets, positioning them well to maintain earnings growth despite the constantly changing operating environment. At this point, I'll hand over to Nga to talk through recent activity.
Thanks, Dave. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much for attending today. Starting with the recent transactions, the companies listed on the left-hand side show businesses we have exited during the period. The decision to exit Qube and Endeavour Group reflects one of two views. We either consider the competitive environment is set to become significantly more intense or there is a negative structural shift occurring in the industry. Sydney Airport and Milton Corporation were sold as a result of successful takeovers. On the far right-hand side, we show existing holdings that we have added to in the last 12 months. We look for buying opportunities in quality businesses that might provide a range of attributes to our portfolio. Short-term share price weakness gave us an opportunity to add to our holdings in Transurban, CSL, Goodman Group, James Hardie, Domino's, Auckland Airport, REA Group, Carsales, and BHP.
We consider all to be high-quality companies. They generate significant free cash flow, run by strong management teams, and have strong balance sheets able to fund future growth. In the New Purchases column, towards the center of the slide, we initiated positions in JB Hi-Fi, Mirvac, and WiseTech during the year. All three businesses are leaders in their respective industries, and in the case of Mirvac and JB Hi-Fi, provide good income to the portfolio or exposure to strong growth in the case of WiseTech. On to slide 22. Dave and I recently returned from a trip to the U.S. where we met with management teams of a number of our key portfolio holdings. In the following slides, we wanted to focus on a few companies that have significant growth opportunities in the U.S. Mainfreight is a New Zealand-listed global logistics operator specializing in less than truckload freight market.
This part of the market is less commoditized, where customers value the higher level of service and value add that Mainfreight offers. The business was founded in New Zealand in 1987 by current chairman Bruce Plested, with longtime CEO Don Braid at the helm. Between Bruce and Don, they own about 18% of the company. We are attracted to owner-driver businesses like Mainfreight with focused management teams. Having established a significant network of assets in New Zealand, they have since expanded into Australia, Europe, Asia, and the U.S. with a mix of owned and leased assets. We had the privilege of visiting the U.S. operations and U.S. management of Mainfreight. We were able to get a better appreciation of the growth opportunity they have ahead of them and the extent of their network infrastructure, which they will continue to densify over time.
We are encouraged that their strategy that they are implementing is sound, and the company has an excellent track record of growth and generating shareholder returns. They also have a strong balance sheet to support this growth. Over the next slide. Carsales. We've spoken about our investment in Carsales in the past. Carsales is Australia's leading used car online classifieds business. Carsales has a dominant market position in Australia, and they continually invest in technology innovation to help dealers sell more cars. The value created for dealers translates to strong cash flow generation for the business. In recent years, the business has successfully expanded overseas via a number of acquisitions, including Encar in South Korea, a 30% stake in Webmotors in Brazil, and more recently, Trader Interactive in the U.S.
We were able to visit Trader Interactive in the U.S. and caught up with CEO Lori Stacy and her senior management team. Trader Interactive has a dominant market position in the U.S. in the RVs and powersports classifieds market, and are a close number two in trucks and equipment. We think they have an opportunity to accelerate market penetration and grow in the U.S. through new products and technology whilst leveraging the IP and knowledge from the Carsales management team here in Australia. Carsales management have a long track record of delivering high returns and growth, including successful overseas expansion. Over to the next slide. James Hardie is the market leader in the manufacturing of fiber cement cladding, where it currently holds about 90% market share. This business has operations in the U.S., Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore.
We had the opportunity to attend the Investor Day in the U.S. recently and met with senior management team over there. The core market is U.S. residential homes, particularly the renovations market. Fiber cement has a number of superior attributes compared to other cladding materials. The product is lightweight, has a wood look and feel, and has historically competed with wood and vinyl. Fiber cement lasts significantly longer than its nearest competitor, vinyl, and requires less regular painting than wood. Since 2005, fiber cement has more than doubled its market share of U.S. homes, with all alternate materials either stable or declining. Its R&D pipeline has led to the recent launch of new lightweight panel brick products, competing with heavy construction materials of stucco and brick.
Capital allocation has been strong, with the company generating. Remains strong despite short-term cyclical headwinds. Onto the next slide. ResMed is the market leader in treatment of obstructive sleep apnea or OSA. OSA occurs while sleeping and results in a temporary narrowing or closing of the airway. The company was founded in 1989 by current chairman Peter Farrell and has evolved from a small industry player to now having more than 50% market share. Our visit to the U.S. gave us even more confidence that they will continue to win share and as their key competitor, Philips, struggles with a major product recall. The company employs over 8,000 people and sells products in more than 140 countries. We like that ResMed generates consistent and strong free cash flow.
They also maintain heavy investment in developing market-leading products and raising consumer awareness of the OSA condition. Long-term industry growth rates are forecast at around 7%-8% per annum, and the opportunity for ResMed as the market leader remains significant. We rate the management team highly, who have developed a long and successful track record of capital allocation, driving return on invested capital higher for the business. I'll now hand back to Mark for some outlook comments. Thanks.
Okay, thanks, Nga. I mean, hopefully those examples give you a bit of a sense or flavor of what we're looking for in our companies. It's been re-emphasized that we are a long-term investor. We wanna be low turnover. We understand that when you have high turnover, it creates a lot of tax, and tax can be quite a significant drag on the investor. Most managed funds out there in the market don't seem to take tax into consideration, and often they have high turnover. We are certainly aware that tax is a real negative drag on performance. We wanna be low turnover.
Therefore, our focus is on finding companies that we think make great investments for the long term, and those characteristics that have been highlighted in those previous slides hopefully give you an understanding of what we're looking for. Just on to the outlook. As has been touched on already, this is an uncertain operating environment. Inflation, and therefore rising interest rates, is new to a lot of people operating in markets. We've certainly seen it before. The result of that, markets have pulled back. Again, what we're trying to highlight is that markets were trading at very lofty valuations, and really the onset of inflation has been a catalyst for markets to move back to fairer value. However, we still have some concern on where earnings will go into the future.
We wouldn't be surprised if there was more downside volatility, but that's when we start getting really interested in adding the good stocks at fair price. That's really been the approach of AFIC. As one of my earlier directors from many years ago used to state, "What we need to do is salt the portfolio with quality stocks bought at attractive prices." They're the key to investing success. The portfolio is positioned, though, to perform in a wide range of operating environments, and has stated that volatility can often bring the best buying opportunities. At the end of the day, the portfolio is investing in well-managed, quality companies that own strategic assets with strong balance sheets. That's the piece that always gives us comfort that we can ride the ups and downs of the market cycles.
Your money is invested in good quality companies, and that's been the approach of AFIC, well certainly ever since I've been involved, but going back longer than that, and we will continue to do that going forward. Now, just to comment, we've had lots of questions on the international portfolio. Just to reiterate for those that don't know, we've put a very small amount of AFIC's funds, which is currently 1.2%, into a portfolio of international stocks. The objective here, that there's a few facets to it. One, potentially it could be a precursor to another LIC.
If we were to do that, I guess some of the attributes we would look for, if we were to start a fund, would be on the basis that we can do it at low cost, so that's consistent with our style with no performance fees, with low turnover, so it's tax effective. We've got three people currently working on that project. Two of them are here today. Feel free to speak to them. The approach is following the AFIC way. Look for companies with strong management teams, businesses that have strong balance sheets, businesses that have competitive advantages that we think are sustainable into the future, and often underpinned by long-term secular growth trends. The other...
I guess there are a couple of elements, having people within the investment team who are looking globally. Many of our companies in AFIC now, they are Australian or New Zealand companies, but they are global companies and understanding what's happening from a global perspective is very important to us to understanding the businesses that we invest in. As Nga pointed out, companies like James Hardie, ResMed, and then looking through broader into the list, CSL, Sonic, Macquarie Group, the list goes on and on. These are international companies. It's important for us to understand what's happening at an international level. Having a team of people that are focused on international stocks, we think adds value to the group. Just on that, the results, I mean, I think have been really encouraging, and I'm really pleased with how it's performing.
It's slightly ahead of its benchmark in what has been a very, very tricky market. That gives us confidence to carry forward with that project. The worst thing that can happen is that we end up with what we have, is 39 stocks that are outstanding global businesses. As I said, we're very encouraged the way the team's performing. With that, I'll pass back to John, and obviously we'll be keen to take questions at the end of the presentation.
Thank you, Mark, and thank you, David and Nga for your comments on the companies, some of the companies in the portfolio. Obviously, when we finish the meeting, you'll have the opportunity to talk to other members of the investment team and ask them, it doesn't matter how difficult the question is, ask them whatever you like of the stocks in the portfolio. I'd now like to invite questions from shareholders, and we'll start initially in this room, but then move to the online portal. For those in this room, we have microphones available and ask shareholders to please state their name when addressing the meeting, and I ask that all questions are made through the chair. Do we have any questions in this room?
Thanks, Mario. It's Holly from IO. Look, two things. One was when you talk about the international thing, I notice over the years that ANZ did and NAB made hashes of international spreading, and I was particularly concerned about that, but you seem to reverse it. The second thing is I see on the big table, there's only three women. Are we planning to get more women in without wanting to kick anybody out?
Right. Well, as chairman, I'll address that. Look, we are completely open to pick the best directors that we can. We made some steps just over 12 months ago when we added Julie. We're certainly very keen to have more women directors on the board, and it's something that will be part of our focus when we're ready to appoint further directors. It's a good thing. We get great benefit from our female directors on all four of the LICs in our stable.
I find women tend to listen and then talk whereas us guys just talk and talk.
Yeah, sometimes the chairman has to make sure that that's what happens too. Now I think we have some questions from the ASA. Yeah.
Thank you. My name is Jason Cole, and I'm a volunteer at the Australian Shareholders' Association. Today I hold 560 proxies for 560 shareholders, totaling about 10.3 million individual shares. Just a question on the dividend. It says on page six of the annual report that AUD 0.10 of the final dividend was sourced from taxable capital gains, and that was much more than in preceding years, which were in the range of between AUD 0.02 and AUD 0.05. Just wondering if you could elaborate on that a little bit more.
I'll pass to Andrew for that question.
Thank you, John. Thank you, Jason. LIC gains, listed investment company gains, are paid out when we can do so. They arise when we make capital gains on selling investments or when we have them sold for us, like Milton Corporation and Sydney Airport. Just to remind shareholders, they're not assets. They don't appear on the balance sheet. They are only useful to tax-paying shareholders, which is why we like to get them out when we can. Because they only arise when we make those capital gains, to put it into context, we had AUD 213 million worth of taxable gains in 2022 compared to AUD 53 million in 2021 and AUD 75 million in 2020.
It'll go up and down, but the intent is when we have more capital gains, we'll pay out more as an LIC gain and less when we don't.
Can I just add to that? This is a really important part of your dividends. Make sure if you're doing your tax return yourself or if you have someone else, your accountant do it, make sure you point out that the dividend has a large component of LIC gains in that, because it depends on your tax rate, but at certain tax rates, it adds a lot of value to your income. Make sure you highlight it to your accountant.
Hello. My name's Michelle Lanera. I'm just wanting to ask a question regarding the ethics of the international shares. How deeply do you look into the ethics in the companies that we've invested in? Generally speaking, I know I have read, heard at other meetings that you do buy into ethical companies, but I have some concerns in the past with James Hardie, for instance, and owner-drivers in Mainfreight, I think it was.
I-
Are their employment situations taken into account? Thank you.
Yeah. Well, I mean, they're all very good considerations. I mean, certainly Hardie's, there was a history around asbestos and, which was a long-term issue for the company. I guess our approach on some of these issues is we think Hardie's has got an incredible business in the U.S. in fiber cement. However, when issues, either historic or new issues come along, what we expect is the company to address it in an appropriate way. What we have done over time, and I remember the early days when we were building up our holding in Hardie's, is to get a deep understanding of what the company was doing about it and that they weren't walking away from the issue.
Obviously, with James Hardie's, they allocated a certain amount of their cash flow to flow into a fund to help support future claims against it, and that was built up over time to support that. The market's obviously well aware of that. The company's doing the right thing to make sure that the current management can support those that have been impacted by something that happened a long time ago. That's what we look for in businesses. That goes for any company we look at where something occurs that we don't like, we just don't go and dump shares, 'cause at the end of the day, it's the shareholder. We own the assets, and we don't wanna see us change as shareholder. We'd rather see the company's management change if we don't think they're running the company appropriately.
Those sort of ethical issues are very important. That applies to all our companies, whether they're part of the Australian portfolio or the international stocks. These issues are front and center, so it's an important part of our investment process. We wanna invest in companies that are doing the right thing, essentially. Mainfreight?
I'll just address the Mainfreight issue. Mainfreight has a very strong culture of looking after their people. In fact, they use owner-drivers to drive their trucks, and they talk about their staff as being family members. We're very much aligned with that sort of culture.
Yeah. I would just add to that. I mean, it's a sign of a good company. A company that treats their staff well is a great indicator of a good company, and we wanna be in good companies. That's one thing we want to understand is the culture of an organization. It's critical to making a great investment. Investing, a big part of investing is about the people. If you don't like the people running a business, then you should be very careful about investing. All right. We might come back to this room next, but I might pass to Geoff for any online questions.
Well, thanks, John. I've got a couple of questions which actually were submitted pre the meeting, and one was about when are we likely to see a benefit from the following investments, which are smaller ones within the portfolio: Auckland International Airport, FINEOS, Nanosonics, PEXA, Temple & Webster, and Xero. So quite a collection there.
Thanks, Geoff. I'll take that question. Just a bit of background, there has been a sharp correction in obviously high growth and unprofitable tech companies. Temple & Webster, Nanosonics, FINEOS are in the AFIC nursery, which make up less than 2% of the portfolio. While PEXA and Xero were the other stocks that were named, are more established growth stocks. In terms of with high growth early-stage businesses, given their need for investment to grow, they're unlikely to pay dividends in the near term, but we're investing in these businesses with the hope that at some future point when they mature, they will be dividend payers and contribute to AFIC's dividend in the long run. We remain comfortable with the long-term growth opportunities of those holdings.
Thanks, Nga. Question for you, David, I think. At the recent AGM, a response was made to a shareholder question and to the effect that the investment in Fortescue Metals Group was not being considered as the sector was covered by investment in BHP and Rio Tinto. I would like to know if the greener credentials of Fortescue, such as their commitment to renewable energy and carbon neutral targets, is likely to sway AFIC toward taking a position in Fortescue.
No, thanks, Geoff, and thanks for the question. It's something that is under consideration, but at the moment, our preference is for BHP and Rio, just given the nature of the product that they produce is a higher grade, so there's more protection when there is volatility in the iron ore price. Even as I mentioned at the lows of the iron ore price that we've seen at various points, they're still able to generate cash to be able to invest in their asset base and be able to pay a dividend. Fortescue produce a lower grade product, which means they're more exposed to any volatility on that front. The future-facing industries that Fortescue has been investing capital into, there is limited information out there at the moment.
Only a couple of weeks ago, they gave you some financial detail about the total spend, but very little in terms of the financial returns that they're gonna generate off that spend. We did catch up with the company on the back of that, and we're continuing our investigations, but at this stage we have a preference for BHP and Rio Tinto.
I'll continue with another stock question. Why have you sold APA Group?
Sure. Thanks, Geoff. We sold out of APA, nothing to do with the company necessarily, nothing to do with the management team. It was really just our view that we had better uses of that capital. The Australian asset base, in our view, is approaching maturity. We look at this business and say, "What do the returns look like over the next five-10 years relative to other places where we could actually put that capital?" I think it highlights too in times of volatility like we're seeing at the moment, businesses that we really wanna be larger parts of the portfolio, we're really getting the chance to be able to add to those at attractive prices.
The capital does need to come from somewhere and the ability to put that into a better longer term opportunity sort of matches with what we're trying to achieve. The other thing you'd notice is the U.S. has long been a potential option for APA to expand into. They have now made a decision that that's no longer gonna be part of the pathway going forward. There's been a CEO change for that business. There's a little bit of uncertainty. Just felt opportunities were better elsewhere.
Thanks, David. Question on why do we own or why do we have an investment, I should say, in Diversified United Investment? Also can we comment on the relationship between AUI and DUI in terms of the context of that investment?
Okay. I'll comment on that. It's a function of history really because we are an LIC. We follow the other LICs and our holding there goes back a long period of time where we just saw an exceptional opportunity to buy what is a very well-run LIC at a great price. Once we bought that, it's performed very well. We've got capital gains there, and we look at it and sort of say, "Well, maybe we should sell it and go into individual stocks." At the same time, because we're tax aware, we sort of think, "Well, if we sell it, we'd pay a whole lot of tax to invest in the market.
We might as well just keep holding the stock and avoid paying the tax because we think it is a good quality LIC." That was really opportunity driven. Out of that stable there's two investment companies, AUI and DUI, but I'm not sort of here to comment on the difference, but it was really just an opportunity we had many, many years ago and we've decided to hang on to it.
I think we see the AUI, DUI situation as not akin to our own stable of where we've got four investment companies, but we haven't been investors in AUI over a long time. Now, we might see if there's any more questions in the room here. I think there's one back on the right in the middle there. Thank you.
Jeff Thomas. Regarding this new government's decision to have a look at the franking credits, we've been through this before and I was wondering if you could comment on what position AFIC's gonna take in regard to dipping into franking credits again?
Right. Well, there's a couple of things in this question. One is also a discussion about whether there should be special taxes on very high oil and gas prices, and that actually is part of a history where we saw special bank taxes and we are very much against corporate taxes that don't generate franking credits. We think if the federal government's going to tax companies, there should be a franking credit attached. We see the whole franking credit system as being a good system for Australia. It has encouraged broad shareholder ownership. It's been underpinning the growth of superannuation to some degree. We, at every point, have whenever there's been a threat to franking, we've enunciated our concerns in Canberra and publicly.
I think if we saw that again, we'd be fairly quick at trying to defend that situation for the AFIC shareholders.
I might add on the specifics of the question. The legislation was intended to specifically address where companies are issuing capital in order to then free up liquidity for shareholders to give it back to them for them to pay a dividend. This was the subject of a tax alert from the ATO in 2015 and initial government legislation in 2016. I would say there are two things. First of all, there are some concerns with the looseness of the wording of the legislation, now it's finally come out. Secondly, there is certainly concerns with making it retrospective. Retrospectivity in tax legislation is normally never a good idea. Thirdly, there is the general, how shall we say, fear that there may be a track record with regard to franking credits.
On the latter, I think the chairman has said, and we're all very strongly in favor of the franking system and will certainly take action if we need to. With this specific legislation, it's very narrow. AFIC and the other LICs are in no danger from it because we don't do that. They do need to be careful in terms of how they word legislation and if they ever use retrospectivity.
We've got another question in the middle here. Thank you.
My question is, when assessing investment opportunities, does AFIC really take into account the possibility of looking at boards that may be gender-neutral?
Dave, you can grab that.
Sorry, do you mind repeating the question? Sorry about that.
Oh, the question was, do we look at boards and to what extent about, the gender situation on that board? How does that come into our thinking on a company?
Yeah, sure.
I'll-
Is that right?
Is this on?
Yep.
Okay, thanks. What I'm saying is, when you're looking at new investment opportunities, and given obviously that the overseas banking investments hasn't worked for some other companies. When you're looking at boards, not only overseas but also in Australia, looking at boards that have strong lady representation. That's putting it plainly.
Yeah, thank you very much for the question. It is one of the things that we have consideration for. When we investigate that, we don't have specific targets that we're looking for. We're in a very privileged position where we do get access to board members across all of our investments. As John mentioned, it's really about the quality of the people running the businesses is so important to the investment returns that we can get. We really welcome the opportunity, and we love the fact that we get to catch up with all board members and understand the contribution that they're making to where our investments are.
The other point I'd like to add is that what we're looking for is a diversity of experience as well as expertise and where appropriate. For example, if it's an industry that lends itself more to a female customer base, it makes a lot of sense in that situation. We're not just looking at gender as the key issue, but it is a consideration.
I might now pass back to Geoff, and we'll have a couple more questions from the online side.
Thanks, John. I might pass to Andrew on this one. There's a question here about are the company's internal controls strong? I guess that's also stemming from what's happened recently with the Optus situation.
Thank you, Geoff. We have a very strong audit committee that's being led by a very strong audit committee chairman, I should point out, and we look forward to the incoming audit committee chairman, who I'm sure will do an equally fantastic job. In response to that question, it's something that we as management, the board and the audit committee do take very seriously. We have an internal audit function that is provided to us by EY. They perform a review of the internal control environment to ensure that it's been functioning appropriately.
They provide that report to the audit committee once a year and do other internal audits during the year as well, which are also reported to the audit committee. All directors have the ability to question EY, either in session or in camera, to ensure that they get the full picture of what is happening. It's something that we do take very seriously. We're quite a simple company in that we don't ourselves keep personal details. That's done through the share registry. Our holdings are held through brokers. Our cash is obviously held through the bank. Notwithstanding the simplicity, it's something we take very seriously.
I might add there, as Andrew said, a lot of our shareholder information actually is held by Computershare and not by us. So at least once a year, we have a session with Computershare where we can ask any questions we want to get a degree of comfort that that information is being managed as well as it could be. So it's something we're very conscious of.
Another question here, John Moore, on a strategic front. Nothing has happened strategically within AFIC's stable since AMCIL was floated back in February 2000. Meanwhile, there have been other LICs which have started up, seven new funds. We've seen Soul Patts take over Milton, and there's obviously another LIC group out there who are buying up other LICs at discount. The question really is about why we are absent from this corporate activity, given we could actually become bigger and then deliver further scale benefits to investors.
Well, firstly, on the scale question, with AFIC at AUD 8 billion, it would make very little difference to our MER or other aspects if we tried to increase that by merging with or taking over other investment companies. Clearly, there is obviously a degree of complexity when you go down that path, and potential for you to get distracted from the most important thing, which is making sure the portfolio performs. In terms of no new products, we certainly don't see the AFIC brand as something that we would attach to a product managed by someone else. We would prefer to, as we did with Djerriwarrh, Mirrabooka, and AMCIL, seed and then grow an existing company in our stable.
That's partly behind the concept of our international portfolio, and we'll see how that evolves over the next few years.
Thanks, John. A question here about why are we still not publicly disclosing how we vote our shares at AGMs, or at least providing a summary of how we voted. This is becoming fairly standard transparency for industry funds and global fund managers, so why doesn't AFIC do the same, adopt the same practice?
Well, I might start with that. We meet with a number of the chairman and other members of the board of companies that we invest in. We are certainly very frank if we don't think they're doing things the way we would like them to be done. I think we feel we get as an investor who's there for a long time and not one that buys and sells stock. I think some companies put more weight relatively on what we're saying than for another institution that may be gone tomorrow. We think those private discussions are more effective, and if it was subject to being headlines on the paper, one would need to be more careful in how that was enunciated.
I think we feel we're playing the game that we think is most effective in getting change or getting notice of companies. Do you have anything else to add, Mark, or?
No, no, that covers it.
Thanks, John. I think the other point to make is we do actually have a high-level summary of how we vote on the website, available on the website. That is there. John, I don't have any further questions relating to this part of the meeting, so.
Right. We might leave any further questions for particularly in this room for the session after we've finished the meeting. We now move to the formal resolutions of the meeting. Your directors' recommendations are set out in the notice of meeting, and I can confirm that where undirected proxies have been given to me as chairman, I'll vote them in line with the board's recommendations on each agenda item. Voting today will be conducted by way of a poll on all items of business, and representatives of Computershare will oversee the conduct of the poll. Firstly, if there is any person present in the room who believes they're entitled to vote, but is not registered to vote, would you please seek assistance from our registry, Computershare. For those in the room, on the reverse of your blue admission card is your voting paper and instructions.
I'll now go through the procedures for filling in the voting papers. In respect of any open votes a proxyholder may be entitled to cast, you need to mark a box beside each resolution to indicate how you wish to cast your open votes. Shareholders also need to mark a box beside each resolution to indicate how you wish to cast your votes. Please ensure you print your name where indicated and sign the voting paper. When you've finished filling in your voting paper, please lodge it in the ballot boxes that will be available at the end of the meeting. The second agenda item is the resolution to adopt the remuneration report. This is required by the Corporations Act to be considered by shareholders annually and is an advisory resolution only. The remuneration report can be found in the company's 2022 annual report.
It's a very detailed report covering the remuneration of directors, the executives, and the investment team. If you have any questions on this item, please submit them now if you've not already done so. I will now show the proxies received in respect of this resolution, which are now on the screen. I remind shareholders and proxy holders who have not yet lodged their votes via the app to do so now as the voting is open. We've had a number of questions regarding remuneration for AFIC executives. There are two main questions. Why has the remuneration risen while AFIC's dividend has been steady at AUD 0.24? Is it appropriate for remuneration to rise in such an uncertain environment? Our remuneration report is complex and consists of 14 pages. I will simplify it as much as I can.
The first component of the report is the base pay. That is determined in comparison with industry investment industry levels to ensure we can retain and attract high-performing executives. In aggregate for the four executives, key executives, this rose only 1.4%. Quite modest. The second element is the short-term incentive. This is largely a reflection of performance relative to the index over one-, three-, five-, and 10-year periods. This fell from 2021, reflecting the fact that we outperformed over the three- and five-year periods, but not the other two periods. The final element, the long-term incentive, rose significantly reflecting vesting of shares in response to our performance over the four-year testing period. We are making two changes to the scheme. Using share price returns will be altered now to reflect NTA returns. Unfortunately, share price has an unpredictable element. The premium or discount movement is random.
Also, previously, AFIC paid all the long-term incentive, and this is now to be shared across all four of our LICs. As Mark said earlier, when you look at the figures in the annual report, only a little bit more than 50% of them are absorbed by AFIC. The other three groups in our stable absorb the other expenses. If you have any questions on this item, please submit them now via the online portal. If you're in this room, we will ask if there's any questions. We might start with the meeting room. Are there any questions here on the remuneration report? Jason.
Thank you. It's just noted in this year's remuneration report that there's further changes proposed for the executive incentive in coming years. Will total shareholder return be retained as one of the performance condition measurements in the new plan? And if not, what protections are in place to ensure that the executive remuneration's aligned with shareholder reward?
I might defer to Andrew.
Thank you, John. No, we're removing the total shareholder return for the reasons that the chairman went into. The variability, it's outside the control. In fact, one of the elements for that long-term incentive being so high was the fact the share price moved from a discount to a premium. We think it's unfair that executives get paid on something that is effectively outside their control. The second thing that I would say is that unlike most other companies, where share price is a proxy for company valuation, with an LIC, you can actually see what the company is valued and how the NTA performs. In that respect, you don't need to use share price.
Thirdly, in answer to your last question, the, all the executives are required to spend roughly 50% of their after-tax incentive on shares in the LICs, which they then must hold for four years. We believe that by doing that share, executives do remain fully aligned with shareholder interests in terms of that share price performance and movement in shareholder wealth.
We might see if Geoff's got any other questions.
Yes. I've got a fairly long question, so apologies up front. There was a 13.6% vote against last year's remuneration report on the director proxies, but the total vote on the resolution was only 85 million shares or 6.9% of the shares on issue. Why aren't the owners of the other shares, 93% on issue, actively participating in our democratic process by directing their votes in a considered manner as opposed to giving undirected proxies to the chair or the ASA? AFIC has more than 100,000 shareholders, making it Australia's most highly owned LIC. In order to improve transparency and boost voting participation at future AGMs, could you please disclose the voting outcomes in terms of both the shares and shareholders, like what happens in a scheme of arrangement?
I suspect more shareholders directed proxies against today's remuneration report than in favor, but there's no disclosure.
There's a few bits in there. One, we always get fairly low number of shareholders who vote. Even when we've had a campaign to encourage them, it doesn't make a lot of difference. I think we feel that that presumably reflects the fact that most of our shareholders are comfortable with what we're doing. In terms of the undirected proxies, again, I think that's a sign that the shareholders presumably are comfortable with the guidance that the board has given as to how those are gonna be voted, and we certainly make it very clear that that's the way we're going to do it. It's very hard to comment on the particular shareholders' views on things, though.
Yeah. I mean, we have 160,000+ shareholders and a very diverse shareholder base. Unless we mail out and continually hassle them about voting, I suspect we're not gonna get those numbers up. We do it a few years ago, when we had some issues to deal with, but even then, we still had a relatively small number of shareholders voting.
I'm reminded of Sir Thomas More's comment that silence should be considered to give consent. We'll see.
Andrew's always very good on literary and historical aspects of things.
I don't have any other questions on this particular resolution.
Right. We will now put the motion, which obviously involves people voting via the blue sheet or the internet. Third agenda item is the resolution to re-elect Rebecca Dee-Bradbury. Rebecca was elected by shareholders at the 2019 AGM, and so is standing for re-election by shareholders today. In accordance with Rule 46 of the company's constitution, she retires from the board of directors and, being eligible, offers herself for re-election. Rebecca, would you care to say a few words before I put the motion?
Thank you. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. It's so hard to believe that it was only three years ago that I stood before you asking for your support to consider my election to the board of AFIC. Your support was greatly appreciated, and it has been an absolute honor to serve you all and the company over the past three years. What a three years it's been. I don't imagine we could have ever anticipated the turbulence and hardship that we would collectively endure. While in some ways we have been changed and challenged to the core, we are also so much clearer in terms of what really matters to us. For those who have suffered loss or are still impacted by the sequelae of COVID, my deepest sympathies. Fortunately, with difficult times, there are also gifts.
It is in the difficult times that we see one's true character, whether their words match their values, their actions match their words, and this is something that I've found particularly positive during my time at AFIC. Despite the challenges of COVID, of lockdowns, and the ensuing market turbulence, the commitment to steward the company in the best interest of our shareholders has been unwavering. Our resolve to invest in companies that represent quality in the medium to long term and delivering reliable dividends has not changed despite everything going on around the world and at home. This is, and always has been, the AFIC way. Now more than ever, when the team looks at quality, in addition to our core framework, the ability to manage and thrive in these times and future readiness of the organization remains critical. For me, having spent most, or actually both
Most of both my executive and non-executive life working with companies undergoing growth transformation and exposed to sectoral transition or disruption, it has been both a fascinating and quite useful, as I aim to support management in their assessment of quality companies and sectors that will not just withstand, but thrive through change and volatility. The corporate history and seasoned tenure across the board, coupled with the new directors, Craig and Julie, enables us to strike a great balance. It has not been linear or easy, nor will it be going forward, yet I remain optimistic. We benefit from the foundations laid by both executive and non-executive executive members who have come before us, including our esteemed retiring board colleague, Peter.
This is further supported by the fresh perspectives of our new non-executive directors, but most importantly, by our committed, talented management team under Mark's leadership, all in the aim of delivering the best possible outcomes for you, our shareholders. I stand before you, deeply grateful to have been able to work with such an amazing team and company, and with your support, it would be an honor to continue to do so as we navigate the next three years in support of your interests. Thank you for considering my candidacy.
Thank you, Rebecca. I'll now show the proxies received in respect of the resolution, and they're on the screen in front of you. Prior to the meeting, we had no questions. I'll open up questions in the room here and see if there's anyone has a question on this resolution. Jason?
Thank you. It's not a question for Rebecca specifically, more on director re-election in general. I acknowledge that the skills of each director is listed biographically in the annual report and the skills the board requires in your corporate governance statement. However, it is quite a time-consuming task to combine those two. The question is, will AFIC publish a skills matrix in tabular form like other ASX-listed companies do, so that shareholders can easily identify any collective skills gaps when they're determining their director re-election?
We do publish an aggregate figure highlighting the skills that are on the board. We've tended not to want to go down the route of putting particular attributes against every director. It does become more difficult in that a former CEO has a certain level of current experience the day he steps out of being a CEO of a company. Five years later, he may or may not still have that. You get into some gray areas if you go into such deep specifics. We do address, have we got banking experience, have we got IT experience, yes or no, and reflect that in terms of the total board situation. Geoff, have we got any other-
I have a question here, and it does eventually get to Rebecca, but I'll read the whole question. Craig Drummond has recently become the president of both Geelong Football Club, which I'm sure he's very happy about, and the chairman of Transurban. Could both Craig and the chair comment on how the non-executive director will have time to fulfill his AFIC duties? Exactly how many hours a week on average do you feel a regular AFIC NED would and should put in? Could Rebecca also comment on a view about the AFIC workload?
Craig, do you want to address your specifics before I comment?
Sure. Thanks, John, and thanks for the question. What I'd say is the Geelong Football Club, I'm a non-executive, non-playing member of the footy club. It's probably over the full year, less than a day a week once you're excluding games, and that's a completely optional thing. I have one other public board, and that's Transurban. I can tell you, I feel completely in control of my time commitment to AFIC.
Thank you, Craig. Look, I've known Craig for a long time. Craig has a great capacity to work, and he's someone who would make sure that anything he took on, he could give 100% effort to. I have no doubts that he's quite capable to accommodate AFIC in his portfolio of interests. AFIC has something like 20 or just over 20 investment meetings a year for the investment committee. Not all members of the board are members of the investment committee, but most of them turn up even if they aren't. Those generally run for an hour. Then there's 12 board meetings a year. They quite often run for 1.5 hours.
It is a fairly simple business, so it's not like running a bank or some of the utility companies and the problems they have nowadays. It's a much simpler proposition that is not probably as demanding in terms of time as such. Rebecca, do-
Thank you. Look, I think the thing that I would say is that there are two benefits that you as shareholders get from the board of directors. The first benefit I think you get is a breadth and depth of insight in overseeing and stewarding your investments. I can categorically assure you from my perspective that there's no one on the board that doesn't dedicate the required time, effort, and consideration on your behalf. I don't see any evidence of workload impeding that. Certainly, I don't feel that in regards to myself.
The second benefit you get is that actually having board directors that are involved in other things enables us to bring insights and perspective to the table, and hopefully to add value to the discussion with management, because we're actually out in other boardrooms and other environments, actually seeing what trends are happening. In fact, it's actually quite healthy for the directors to have multiple interests, in my view. The workload is consistent. It's actually as much about being available should management require you to have a discussion or have a perspective. I think Mark's probably best to answer that, but I don't get any sense that there's any shortfall in terms of availability either, and I don't feel it's anything but enjoyable, not stressful.
Thank you, Rebecca and Craig, for your comments.
I don't have any further questions, John.
Right. We might move to the fourth agenda item, which is the special resolution concerning the amendments to the constitution. It is proposed that the company's constitution be amended to reflect changes in law, regulation, and market practice since the constitution was last updated. A marked-up copy of the constitution showing the proposed changes has been available on the company's website, and copies have been made available for inspection at the company's registered office. A copy of the constitution is also available at this meeting. I move that for the purposes of Section 136(2) of the Corporations Act 2001, Commonwealth, and for all other purposes, the constitution of the company be amended as set out in the document made available at afi.com.au/shareholders, and signed by the chairman for the purpose of identification with effect from the close of the meeting.
I'll now show the proxies received in respect of this resolution. There were no questions asked prior to the meeting concerning this. Are there any questions in the room here? Any, Geoff?
I don't have any questions.
No
particular resolution, John.
Right. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our discussion on the items of business. In a couple of minutes, I'll close the voting system. Please ensure that you have cast your vote on all resolutions. For those in the room, may I now ask that you complete your voting card. Computershare staff will collect your voting card at the end of the meeting. I'd like to thank shareholders for your continued support and for the interest you've shown in the affairs of the company by your attendance in person or virtually. Shareholders are reminded that the team will be holding shareholder meetings in Adelaide, Perth, Canberra, Brisbane, Sydney during the second half of October. Online voting is now closed, and the results of these votes will be released as soon as practical to the ASX later today.
Just repeating, thank you, Peter Williams, for your great effort since 2010. It's been very much appreciated by ourselves and I think the shareholders.
Thank you very much for attendance, and we can now adjourn for refreshments and any further questions you may have of any of the team. Thank you very much.