Women continue to gain ground in the boardrooms of Canadian companies, but their progress in top executive positions remains stalled, according to new data from securities regulators.

The share of board seats occupied by female directors climbed to 29% in the regulators’ latest review of issuers’ disclosures, up from 27% last year. Additionally, the vast majority of companies now have at least one female director, at 90% in the past year, up from 89% in the previous year.

Both metrics reflect significant progress since the regulators began mandating these disclosures 10 years ago.

Back then, just 11% of board seats were held by women, and less than half (49%) had at least one woman director.

At the same time, there’s been almost no movement in the proportion of female CEOs and CFOs, the report indicated.

Just 5% of companies have a female CEO, unchanged over the past five years. And the share of female CFOs is down slightly to 16% this year, from 17% in the previous year, and 19% the year before that.

Despite the lack of progress in the top roles, regulators also reported that 72% of companies now have at least one female among their top five executives — up from 71% last year, and 60% when the disclosure was first mandated.

“We have seen an increase in representation of women on boards and in executive positions over the last 10 years,” said Stan Magidson, chair of the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) and chair and CEO of the Alberta Securities Commission (ASC).

“Investors have advised that they value disclosure about an organization’s diversity and we continue to work toward a harmonized national diversity disclosure framework that goes beyond the representation of women,” he added.

Indeed, the regulators have completed a consultation on proposed changes to diversity disclosure requirements that could expand reporting beyond gender to other under-represented groups.

“We continue to work towards a harmonized national disclosure framework that considers comments received during our consultation period,” the regulators said.