JPMorgan Chase Drops Proxy Advisers and Shifts JPM Coin to Canton Network

JPMorgan Chase has officially cut ties with external proxy advisory firms in a significant move that reshapes how the banking giant manages its massive investment portfolio. The bank’s asset-management division confirmed on Wednesday, January 7, 2026, that it has ended all relationships with these third-party consultants. This change is effective immediately. 

The unit is responsible for managing more than $7 trillion in assets for various clients. Every year, it must cast votes at thousands of public company meetings. The decision arrives as the proxy advisory industry faces intense scrutiny from the federal government.

For decades, the banking industry relied on outside firms to help decide how to vote on corporate issues. JPMorgan is now moving away from that traditional model. To handle the workload, the bank will use its own internal artificial intelligence system. 

This platform is called Proxy IQ. It will manage the voting process for U.S.-based companies starting this proxy season. An internal memo reported by The Wall Street Journal suggests that the system will review data from over 3,000 annual shareholder meetings.

Proxy IQ does more than just organize data. It sends vote recommendations directly to the bank’s portfolio managers. In the past, these tasks were the responsibility of outside proxy advisers. JPMorgan believes it is the first major investment firm to fully stop using these external services. 

The bank had already started doing more of its own research through its internal stewardship team. Now, Proxy IQ will replace the remaining duties these advisers held, such as deep analysis and the actual execution of votes.

The Decline of the Proxy Adviser Stronghold

The proxy advisory business is currently under significant pressure. This is largely due to actions from the Trump administration. The president recently ordered regulators to take a closer look at the sector. For a long time, the market has been dominated by two main firms: Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) and Glass Lewis. 

These firms sell research and advice to investors who have to vote on a huge number of corporate proposals. Their influence is felt across the entire financial industry.

However, many people are unhappy with how much power these two firms have. Critics and corporate leaders argue that proxy advisers have too much influence over shareholder votes. 

They also claim the firms operate with business models that have built-in conflicts of interest. In December, reports indicated that President Donald Trump signed an executive order regarding this issue. He directed securities and antitrust regulators to investigate the practices of these firms.

ISS responded to the news of the executive order. The firm stated that it does not dictate how companies should be run. It also noted that its clients are free to make their own voting choices. Despite this, the pressure remains high. 

Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan, has been one of the most vocal critics of these firms. During an industry event last year, he called proxy advisers “incompetent.” He went even further, saying they “should be gone and dead, done with.”

The industry is already reacting to these changes. Glass Lewis announced that it will stop providing its broad benchmark voting recommendations by the year 2027. Instead, the firm will focus on providing custom advice for individual clients. 

While larger managers like JPMorgan can build their own internal teams, smaller firms on Wall Street still rely heavily on these advisers. JPMorgan’s shift to an AI-driven internal system marks a major turning point for the industry’s status quo.

Expanding JPM Coin to the Canton Network

While JPMorgan is changing how it handles corporate voting, it is also expanding its reach in the digital asset space. The bank’s blockchain division, known as Kinexys, is working with a company called Digital Asset. Together, they plan to bring JPM Coin natively to the Canton Network. 

JPM Coin is a digital token that represents U.S. dollar deposits at the bank. This move will take the token from JPMorgan’s own internal systems and place it onto a public, institutional-grade blockchain.

The bank is following a “multi-chain” strategy. It has already started testing JPM Coin on Coinbase’s Base network for its institutional clients. Now, the Canton Network will be another important part of that plan. 

JPM Coin is described as the first bank-issued, USD-denominated deposit token. It is designed specifically for large institutions. It gives them a way to move money faster and more securely using blockchain technology.

There is a growing demand for this kind of technology. Both new digital companies and traditional firms want to move money with more speed. Yuval Rooz, the co-founder and CEO of Digital Asset, spoke about the benefits of this partnership. He said the collaboration helps bring “regulated digital cash” to life. He noted that this cash can now “move at the speed of markets.”

Naveen Mallela is the global co-head of Kinexys by JPMorgan. He explained that the partnership helps the whole industry move forward. By using public blockchains, firms can enjoy the security of a bank-issued deposit. 

At the same time, they get the innovation of blockchain transactions that happen in near real-time, 24 hours a day. The Canton Network itself is a layer-one blockchain built for finance. It balances privacy with the need to follow financial regulations. It is governed by the Canton Foundation and involves several major financial institutions.

A New Era for Institutional Digital Finance

The integration of JPM Coin onto the Canton Network will not happen all at once. Digital Asset and Kinexys are taking a phased approach that will last through 2026. The first step is to build the technical and business rules needed to issue and redeem the tokens. 

Once this is ready, the tokens can move across the Canton ecosystem seamlessly. This is a big change from having the digital cash stuck on a single bank’s private ledger.

The two partners also want to explore other products. They are looking into bringing JPMorgan’s blockchain deposit accounts to the Canton Network. This could give companies more ways to manage their cash on-chain. This is especially useful for those already working with tokenized securities. The idea is to create a system where cash and assets can move together and settle almost instantly.

The Canton Network has its own native token called Canton Coin. This token has seen a lot of interest lately. This interest grew after pilots involving tokenized U.S. Treasury securities were successful. People are starting to see Canton Coin as a key asset for institutional decentralized finance, or DeFi. By bringing JPM Coin to this network, JPMorgan is helping to link traditional banking with these new digital markets.

The bank has been very busy with other blockchain projects as well. Last month, JPMorgan’s asset-management division launched a tokenized money-market fund. This fund is on the Ethereum blockchain and is called the “MONY” fund. The bank started the fund with $100 million of its own money before inviting other investors to join. This fund runs on the bank’s internal Kinexys Digital Assets platform.

Even though Jamie Dimon has criticized Bitcoin in the past, his bank is a leader in blockchain. JPMorgan has been experimenting with this technology for years. They even built their own version of the Ethereum blockchain called Quorum. Now, through Kinexys and partnerships with networks like Canton, the bank is making digital money a core part of its business. 

These moves show that JPMorgan is committed to using new technology to make financial systems more efficient. The shift toward AI for voting and blockchain for payments marks a new chapter for the world’s largest bank.