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Women shareholders have on average 23.7% less shareholding in Valencian companies than men

Gender equality in the business world is not reflected in the ownership and management of companies, according to the latest report from the GECE Observatory, an initiative between CaixaBank and Ivie to boost competitiveness of Valencian firms. According to the report, the percentage of women shareholders in Valencian firms stands at 20.6%, compared to the national average of 22.6%, i.e. only one in five shareholders in the region is a woman.

The GECE Observatory document “Análisis de la posición de las mujeres en la propiedad y en el gobierno de las empresas” (Analysis of the position of women in the ownership and managment of Valencian firms), which was presented at the conference organized by Ivie and CaixaBank at its headquarters in Valencia, studies the presence of women in the ownership and managing bodies of firms in the region and compares the data with the national average.

The event was presented by Eva Blasco, president of CEV Valencia and the Valencian Association of Business Professional Women (EVAP/BPW), along  with Felipe Pulido, commercial director of CaixaBank Companies in the Valencia Region, and Pilar Chorén, managing director of the Ivie.

Additionally, there was a round table discussion, moderated by Enrique Nogués, director of the Valencia Business Center of CaixaBank, with participation by two businesswomen who discussed their experience in the Valencian Community: Amaya Fernández de Uzquiano, president of the Valencian Association of Plastics Companies, president of the Packaging Cluster, CEO of IRISEM and co-founder and director of Nunsys; and Araceli Císcar, executive director and director of Dacsa Group.

Ivie researcher and GECE Observatory coordinator, Alejandro Escribá, highlighted the main messages of the new report. According to the GECE Observatory report, the presence of women shareholders is not only lower than that of men, but also the average percentage of capital owned by each woman is also lower than that of men.

Specifically, while men hold an average of 68.9% of the capital in the companies in which they participate, the average shareholding of women is 52.5%, i.e. 23.7% less than that of men. The gap between men and women is most evident in the case of companies in which a single director controls management, while it narrows considerably in those with a board of directors, with an average shareholding of 44.7% for men, compared to 39.3% for women.

The document focuses its analysis not only on ownership, but also on the presence of women in the board of directors. On average, women account for 23.6% of the members of the board of directors of Valencian firms. A percentage that, in the case of Spanish firms, rises to 24.9%, 1.3 percentage points more. In any case, the report highlights that “the presence of women is still far from the desired percentage (40%) proposed by the European Parliament”.

In this variable, differences are also observed between companies that have a board of directors and those that are governed by a single administrator. In the former, the weight of women directors is 22.5%, while sole administrators account for 30.7% of the total.

Besides the presence of women in governing bodies of firms, the document studies their position in the most authoritative roles in the companies. In this regard, only 16.4% of the positions of President of Valencian companies are held by women, 0.8 percentage points below the figure reached in the national average.