Good morning and welcome to the 2025 Annual Meeting of Shareholders of Diamond Hill Investment Group Inc. I am Scott Cooley, Chair of the Board of Directors at Diamond Hill and Chair of today's meeting. We are excited to be hosting our first virtual annual meeting. Before we begin, I would like to take a moment to introduce the other directors of the company who are present today: Heather Brilliant, Gordon Fowler, Paula Meyer, Chair of the Nominating and Governance Committee, Nicole St. Pierre, Chair of the Compensation Committee, and L'Quentus Thomas, Chair of the Audit Committee. Also joining me are Carlotta King, Corporate Secretary and General Counsel, who will serve as the Secretary of this meeting, and Kathy Wheaton, who is a representative of Broadridge Financial Services and is the Inspector of Elections for this meeting. I would also like to extend a special thank you to Jim Laird.
Jim's tenure term as a director has come to an end, and so he will not be standing for reelection. I want to thank Jim for his outstanding service to Diamond Hill and its shareholders over the past 10 years and wish him well. We will now convene the 2025 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. We will have time prior to opening the polls for voting to respond to questions on the proposals. Shareholders may ask questions by submitting them in writing in the designated field on the web portal. Please note that this meeting is being recorded. However, no one attending this meeting is permitted to use any audio recording device. I will now ask Carlotta King to report on the notice of and presence of a quorum for this meeting.
The Board of Directors fixed March 3, 2025, as the record date for determining the shareholders entitled to vote at this meeting. An affidavit has been delivered by Broadridge Financial Services attesting to the fact that either, one, a notice of internet availability, the proxy statement, and the 2024 Annual Report to Shareholders were made available on the internet, or, two, the documents themselves were mailed on or about March 14th, 2025, to all shareholders as of the record date and will be incorporated into the minutes of this meeting. The shareholder list shows that as of the record date, there were 2,787,492 shares of common stock outstanding and entitled to vote at this meeting. We are informed by the Inspector of Election that a majority of such shares are present in person or represented by proxy at this meeting. Accordingly, a quorum exists and we may conduct business.
Thank you, Carlotta. As set forth in the notice of meeting and our proxy materials, there are four matters to be considered and acted upon at this meeting. I will now ask you to present each of the proposals to be voted on at this meeting.
The first matter before this meeting is the election of six directors to serve one-year terms until our 2026 Annual Meeting of Shareholders and until their successors have been duly elected and qualified. The director nominees are Heather Brilliant, Scott Cooley, Gordon Fowler, Paula Meyer, Nicole St. Pierre, and L'Quentus Thomas, each of whom is a current director. The board recommends a vote for each of the director nominees.
No other nominees have been submitted for election pursuant to the company's Code of Regulations or its Corporate Governance Guidelines. Therefore, I declare the nominations closed. Carlotta, please present the other matters to be voted on at this meeting.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The second matter before this meeting is the ratification of the appointment of KPMG LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2025, as disclosed in the proxy statement for this meeting. KPMG has served as our independent registered public accounting firm since October 2012. The board recommends a vote for the ratification of the appointment of KPMG for the 2025 fiscal year. The third matter before this meeting is the approval and adoption of the Diamond Hill Investment Group Inc 2025 Equity and Cash Incentive Plan. The plan is attached in full as Appendix A to the proxy statement for this meeting. The board recommends a vote for the approval and adoption of the 2025 Equity and Cash Incentive Plan.
The fourth matter is the approval on an advisory basis of the 2024 compensation of the company's named executive officers, as disclosed in the proxy statement for this meeting. The board recommends a vote for the approval of the 2024 compensation of the company's named executive officers. That concludes the presentation of the proposals.
Thank you, Carlotta. If any shareholder would like to make a comment or ask a question regarding any of the proposals, please submit your comment or question through the web portal at this time.
Hi, this is Lara Hoffmans, Head of Marketing at Diamond Hill. We will give everyone just a few moments to submit any questions or comments if there are any. It does not look like we received any questions at this time, so I will turn the meeting back over to Scott Cooley.
Thank you, Lara. The polls for voting are now open. Any shareholder who has not yet voted or wishes to change their vote may do so by clicking on the voting button on the web portal and following the instructions reflected there. Shareholders who have sent in proxies or voted via telephone or internet and do not want to change their vote do not need to take any further action. Now that everyone has had the opportunity to vote, I declare the polls for the 2025 Annual Shareholder Meeting closed. Carlotta, will you please report the preliminary voting results?
Mr. Chairman, I have been informed by the Inspector of Elections that the preliminary vote report shows that, one, each of the six directors nominated have been elected as a director of the company for a one-year term expiring at our 2026 Annual Meeting of Shareholders and until their successors are duly elected and qualified. Two, the appointment of KPMG as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for the 2025 fiscal year has been ratified. Three, the Diamond Hill Investment Group Inc 2025 Equity and Cash Incentive Plan has been approved and adopted. Four, the shareholders have approved on an advisory basis the 2024 compensation of our named executive officers. We will be reporting the final vote results in a Form 8-K to be filed with the SEC within four business days.
Thank you, Carlotta. This concludes our formal business for today. For those of you not aware, this year's shareholder meeting will not be followed by an annual management presentation. Instead, that presentation was posted on Diamond Hill's Investor Relations website on March 12, 2025. You can access that presentation via the link in the lower right-hand corner of your screen or by visiting Diamond Hill's website. If you have any questions about the content in that presentation, please reach out to us by email at ir@diamondhill.com. The 2025 Annual Meeting of Shareholders of Diamond Hill Investment Group Inc is hereby adjourned. Thank you for attending. We appreciate you and your continued support of Diamond Hill.
The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.