London Stock Exchange Group said today that it had followed the "proper governance process" for its CEO succession.
This comes after major shareholder TCI Fund Management called on Chairman Donald Brydon to step down, saying that CEO Xavier Rolet was being forced out.
The fund, which owns more than 5% of the stock exchange, said in a letter reviewed by Reuters that it wanted Rolet's contract to be extended to 2021 and asked the company to suspend the search for a new CEO immediately.
LSE said today that the Financial Conduct Authority had been kept informed throughout the process.
The company said that Xavier Rolet will provide input into the process to find his successor and is focused on his role as CEO until one is appointed.
LSE announced on October 19 that Rolet will step down at the end of next year, just under a decade after he took charge and transformed the company with a string of deals.
Rolet, who joined the group from Lehman Brothers, said last year that he would leave if a merger with rival Deutsche Boerse went through.
But the collapse of that deal in March meant he opted to stay on for longer.
TCI said it had met with Brydon and a senior independent director last week and did not get a satisfactory answer for Rolet's departure and that it would call for an Extraordinary General Meeting if Rolet was not retained as CEO.
The shareholder activism comes at a time when LSE is vying to win a slice of Saudi Aramco's initial public offering, expected to be the biggest corporate listing in history.
