Corporate actions are anything that a company does that has a direct impact on shareholdings or that involves payments to or from shareholders.
Examples of corporate actions include rights issues, scrip issues, splits, consolidations, demergers and dividend payments.
Handling corporate actions easily and efficiently is one of the biggest advantages to a company of using an external registrar. It is also equally an advantage to large investors of using a custodian.
The use of automated paperless clearing houses and depositary systems has greatly reduced the administrative costs of corporate actions.