Rakhi Kumar, global head of asset stewardship and ESG with State Street Global Advisors (SSGA), has warned that her firm’s patience is running out with portfolio companies that aren’t heeding the asset manger’s warnings on topics such as board diversity, refreshment and climate change.‘Given that we started talking about some of these issues in 2011,…
Tag: institutional investors
Mutual Fund Transparency and Corporate Myopia
We often hear that corporate executives believe the pressure to issue quarterly figures and guidance leads to over-emphasis on short-term returns. A new paper by Vikas Agarwal (Georgia State University), Rahul Vashishtha (Duke University), and Mohan Venkatachalam (Duke University) provides some welcome focus on another source of short-term pressure, the reporting requirements imposed on mutual…
Asset managers accused of grandstanding on Persimmon pay | Portfolio Adviser
Asset managers who slammed Persimmon pay packages this AGM season have been silent when questioned over their voting record at the UK housebuilder, which enabled executive remuneration to soar.<P><P>At this year’s AGM, held in April, 48.5% of shareholder votes were cast against the pay report, which sees chief executive Jeff Fairburn receive a whopping £75m.<P><P>But…
Felix Salmon: Index funds are not to blame for excessive CEO pay.
We have heard a lot of weird and convoluted theories about excessive CEO pay, but the one Felix Salmon takes on here may be the ultimate: Who is to blame for bloated CEO pay? Your favored answer to that question will tend to reflect your prior beliefs, which is why high pay is now being…
How Long-Term Investors Influence Corporate Behavior
Annotated opening paragraphs of an article on the impact of long-term investors in the MITSloan journal: In his recent letter to CEOs, Larry Fink, CEO and chairman of the mutual fund giant BlackRock Inc., based in New York City, repeated his call for organizations to share their strategies for creating sustainable value. He also added…
BlackRock turns up the pressure on gun makers – Mar. 2, 2018
BlackRock, calling the issue of gun manufacture and sales one of “tremendous urgency,” is engaging with its portfolio companies: It said it has already had “constructive discussions” with some of the companies. It plans to ask gun makers how they’ll deal with the reputation and legal risks associated with manufacturing civilian firearms, and if they…
How are Shareholder Votes and Trades Related?
Rutgers Assistant Professor Sophia Zhengzi writes: Are shareholder votes a sufficient form of voice that catalyzes trades across the board? Are shareholders’ votes and trades correlated? And do shareholders update their trading patterns based on the information conveyed by other investors’ votes? We address these questions by examining the relation between votes and volume at…
At BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street, ‘Engagement’ Has Different Meanings – WSJ
Sarah Krause writes in the WSJ about large institutional investors’ differing views of “engagement,” noting that they also differ on their analysis of particular engagement/activism opportunities. The biggest passive money managers all like to use some version of the word “engage” when describing how they hold their portfolio companies accountable behind the scenes. They differ on…
CalPERS examines adopting SDGs | Top1000Funds.com
The board of CalPERS has directed staff to look into aligning its $357 billion portfolio with the UN’s sustainable development goals.The largest pension fund in the US is already one of the global leaders in engaging with companies on ESG risks, but by adopting the UN SDGs it would embrace more specific social objectives, such…
Vanguard’s quarter-trillion in fossil fuel investments
Vanguard is one of the world’s largest asset managers, handling the retirement savings of millions of Americans. Its mission is to help people save for the future. At the same time, it’s playing a major role directing billions in funding to carbon polluters — companies maintaining and expanding the fossil fuel infrastructure that threatens to make the…
