Good morning, everyone. It is a pleasure to welcome our shareholders to the annual meeting of Smithfield Foods, Inc. My name is Tennille Checkovich, Chief Legal Officer of Smithfield Foods. At this time, it is my honor to introduce Chairman Wan, who will call the meeting to order and introduce our officers and directors in attendance. Translation will be provided by our director, Xiaoming Zhou.
Good morning. My name is Long Wan, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Smithfield Foods. The meeting is now called to order. I've asked Tennille Checkovich, Chief Legal Officer, to act as moderator, and David Coleman, Corporate Secretary, to record the minutes of this meeting.
Before proceeding to the formal business, I would like to recognize our Chief Executive Officer and Director, Shane Smith, and the other directors of the corporation, all of whom are attending today: Hank Shenghua He, Lijun Guo, Hongwei Wan, Xiaoming Zhou, Marie Gallagher, John Crouch, and Raymond Starling.
I would also like to recognize another member of our executive team attending today, Mark Hall, Chief Financial Officer. I'd also like to welcome the representatives from Ernst & Young, Smithfield Foods' independent audit firm. I will now turn it over to Tennille Checkovich to moderate the remainder of the meeting.
Thank you, Chairman Wan. We will now proceed with the formal business of the meeting as set forth in the notice of annual meeting and proxy statement, a copy of which was mailed on or about April 20th, 2026 to all those who were shareholders of record at the close of business on April 8th, 2026. Shareholders of record on that date are entitled to vote at this meeting. We have electronically posted to the virtual meeting platform a record of shareholders as of that date. A duplicate record has been on file at the principal place of business of the corporation for the last 10 days immediately prior to the date of this meeting and has been available for inspection by any shareholder during that period at any time during normal business hours. The agenda and rules of conduct for the meeting are available on the meeting login screen.
Please note that only shareholders who have logged in using their 13-digit control number will be able to vote and ask questions at the meeting. If any shareholder wishes to address the chair during the formal part of this meeting, please do so by submitting your question in writing through the virtual meeting platform via the link provided. Any questions will be answered either during the meeting or after the meeting in due course. The board of directors has appointed Marlene Aguilar, serving in an independent inspector of election capacity through Broadridge Financial Solutions to act as the inspector of election for this annual meeting. She has duly taken an oath to faithfully execute the duties of the office with strict impartiality and to the best of her ability.
The inspector is responsible for confirming the presence of a quorum, supervising the voting process based on tabulation results provided through Broadridge's platform, and certifying the final voting results. The inspector's oath will be filed with the minutes of this meeting. The Inspector of Election has informed me that of the 393,447,263 shares of common stock entitled to vote at the meeting, at least 379,728,041 shares are represented, either in person or by proxy, and therefore, a quorum is present. We may now proceed to transact the business for which this meeting has been called. Let me briefly describe the voting procedures. If you have previously turned in your proxy and you do not intend to change your vote, it is not necessary that you complete another proxy or ballot.
Your vote will be counted. If you are eligible to vote and have not submitted your proxy, or if you want to change your vote, you may do so by clicking on the link provided through the virtual meeting platform. In order to allow shareholders to vote through the virtual meeting platform at any time during the meeting, I now declare the polls open for voting. It is now 8:00 A.M. on June second, 2026. Our first item of business is the election of Class two directors. At this meeting, we will be voting on three nominees for directors to serve for a term of three years, all as set forth in the proxy statement. In accordance with the bylaws, your directors have nominated Wan Long, Hank Shenghua He, and Raymond A. Starling to be elected to serve as directors.
The corporation's bylaws require that a shareholder provide advance notice to the corporation of a shareholder's intent to nominate persons as directors. No such notice was received. Accordingly, I declare the nominations for directors closed. The board of directors unanimously recommends that shareholders vote in favor of each of the nominees for director. The second item of business is the ratification of the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP, or EY, as the corporation's independent registered public accounting firm for the fiscal year ending January 2, 2027, or fiscal 2026. The audit committee of the board of directors appointed EY as the corporation's independent registered public accounting firm to audit the corporation's financial statements for fiscal 2026. The board of directors approved the selection of EY and has asked the shareholders to ratify the selection. Shareholder ratification is not required by the corporation's bylaws.
However, the board of directors is submitting this to the shareholders for ratification as a matter of good corporate governance. If the shareholders do not approve the selection of EY as the corporation's independent registered public accounting firm, the board of directors and the audit committee will reconsider the appointment. The third item of business is the advisory vote to approve the compensation paid to our named executive officers in fiscal year 2025, as disclosed in the proxy statement. The board of directors unanimously recommends that shareholders vote in favor of this proposal. Anyone who has not yet voted and desires to do so, please do so now through the virtual meeting platform. The polls will remain open briefly to allow for any final voting. We will now turn to questions submitted through the virtual meeting platform.
In accordance with the rules of conduct for this meeting, we have not received any questions relating to the specific agenda items on which shareholders are entitled to vote, and therefore, we will not be conducting Q&A at this time. It is now 8:00 A.M. on June 2, 2026, and the polls for each matter to be voted on at this meeting are now closed. No additional proxies or votes and no changes or revocations will be accepted. The Inspector of Election has provided me with the preliminary results of the voting. With regard to proposal one, a plurality of the shares present or represented and entitled to vote has been voted in favor of the election of each of the persons nominated
With regard to proposal two, a majority of the shares present or represented and entitled to vote have been voted in favor of EY as the corporation's independent registered accounting firm for the fiscal year ending January 2, 2027. With regard to proposal three, a majority of the shares present or represented and entitled to vote have been voted in favor of the compensation paid to our named executive officers in fiscal year 2025. I declare that all of the proposals presented at the meeting have been ratified or approved by the shareholders. The final results of voting, including any votes recorded during this meeting, will be set forth in the Inspector of Election's final report and will be included in the minutes of the meeting. The final results will also be included in our reports filed with the SEC.
There being no other matters for consideration at this meeting, I hereby adjourn this meeting.
The meeting has now concluded. Thank you for joining, and have a pleasant day.