This site uses cookies to improve your experience. To help us insure we adhere to various privacy regulations, please select your country/region of residence. If you do not select a country, we will assume you are from the United States. Select your Cookie Settings or view our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.
Cookie Settings
Cookies and similar technologies are used on this website for proper function of the website, for tracking performance analytics and for marketing purposes. We and some of our third-party providers may use cookie data for various purposes. Please review the cookie settings below and choose your preference.
Used for the proper function of the website
Used for monitoring website traffic and interactions
Cookie Settings
Cookies and similar technologies are used on this website for proper function of the website, for tracking performance analytics and for marketing purposes. We and some of our third-party providers may use cookie data for various purposes. Please review the cookie settings below and choose your preference.
Strictly Necessary: Used for the proper function of the website
Performance/Analytics: Used for monitoring website traffic and interactions
Pressure on creatives: PR, advertising firms targeted by fossil fuel divestment movement. Stephen Woodford, CEO of the Advertising Association in the United Kingdom, believes it therefore is becoming increasingly untenable for advertising, PR and lobbying firms to engage in blatant greenwashing on behalf of fossil fuel clients. "I
Two-thirds of funds in the EU labelled with sustainable or ESG-related terms may need to sell assets or change their names to align with new anti-greenwashing rules, with stock divestments of as much as $40 billion if all were to keep their names, according to a new report released by investment research firm Morningstar.
EE: There’s a general concern about greenwashing and the dissonance between what many companies say they believe about ESG issues and what they are actually doing. Do you feel corporate greenwashing has increased or decreased from the 1970s and ’80s? Both divestment and shareholder action have a role.
From 2021 to May this year, 22 investors, including banks and pension funds, have divested from JBS or its subsidiaries, citing its links to biodiversity loss and governance issues, according to the Financial Exclusion Tracker project. JBS is widely regarded as an ESG pariah.
Slow-to-change investors and greenwashers in the business community will lose their cover to continue propping up the fossil fuel economy. Sustainable investments should grow as divestment from carbon-intensive industries intensifies. Faster private- and public-sector innovation to get emissions down should follow.
The reaction of major Canadian oil and gas companies to new federal anti-greenwashing rules has been telling. Nearly all of these major investors say that they are “engaging” with high-carbon investees in their portfolios in order to advance net-zero, setting this up as a binary choice against divestment.
Tariq Fancy, former BlackRock chief investment officer for sustainable investing, in a recent TEDx talk called fossil fuel divestment a placebo, equating it to giving wheatgrass juice to a cancer patient. Profit maximization is still the end goal, so sustainable investors need to expect greenwashing and do their homework before buying in.
We used to be concerned about greenwashing, but now it seems that many companies are deliberately staying quiet in what some are calling greenhushing – the practice of downplaying or keeping quiet about their sustainability initiatives. Divestment is different from ESG, which is different from impact investing. 2023-06-30 U.S.
This week in ESG news: 100% of large companies expect to be required to report on sustainability, but less than a third are ready for ESG data assurance, KPMG finds; Microsoft buys nearly 1 million tons of nature-based carbon removal credits; BlackRock launches new suite of low carbon transition ETFs; GRI launches standards to report on company impact (..)
Five of the global supermajors are spending around US$750 million annually on greenwashing while allocating just 12% of capital expenditures to “low-carbon” activities, according to think tank InfluenceMap. Manley also said that “we’re already seeing Big Oil become Big Energy,” but this belief is mistaken.
Similarly, 69% of investors reported that they would increase their investments in companies that successfully manage sustainability issues relevant to the business’s performance and prospects, and 67% would increase investment in companies that change their business conduct to have a beneficial impact on society or the environment.
along with ongoing corporate greenwashing and fossil-fuel disinformation, it’s sometimes hard to tell if society is moving forward or slipping back. In 2016, we created the Clean200 in response to investors saying, ‘If we divest fossil fuels, there is nothing to invest in.’” You follow the money, of course. through those years.
McMurdo anticipates more such rebellions this year, which he says reflects the pervasive greenwashing evident in net zero plans. Disputing divestment. We cannot just divest from fossil fuels; we need a fair and just transition to the net zero economy.”. And McMurdo’s caution about divestment is not limited to the energy sectors.
Direct litigation risks include challenging investors’ mismanagement of climate and biodiversity-related risk, breaches of fiduciary duty, greenwashing, or financing environmental and human rights-related harms.
EU markets regulator the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) released its finalized guidelines on ESG Funds’ Names earlier this year, aimed at protecting investors from greenwashing risk, and detailing minimum standards and thresholds for funds using ESG and sustainability-related terms in their names.
Similarly, ESG factors featured prominently in the top reasons for investors to reject or divest from real asset investments, with lack of clarity around ESG credentials or impact reported by 38% of respondents, and concerns over the level of performance or disclosure on ESG grounds by 32%, ranked only behind historical underperformance at 47%.
Renaming trend may lead to a short uptick in greenwashing, but ultimately will accelerate the path to net zero and offer sustainable investors more choice. The decision to rebrand a fund often raises eyebrows, with investors “intuitively suspicious” of the activity due to greenwashing concerns among others.
Indeed, nearly half (49%) of investors globally would divest from companies that are not taking sufficient action on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues. Market and investor pressure, business impact, and customer pressure are shaping the demand for sustainable business practices.
CDPQ was deemed a climate leader, with the report highlighting the asset owner’s decision to divest of firms involved in oil production, refining and coal mining in 2022. Unrivalled ownership power The assessed pool included climate leaders and laggards, Shift found.
Direct litigation risks include challenging investors’ mismanagement of climate and biodiversity-related risk, breaches of fiduciary duty, greenwashing, or financing environmental and human rights-related harms.
A number of asset managers have revised the categorisation of their funds under SFDR, in light of further regulatory guidance, to avoid claims of greenwashing. . Sadan also advised that in order to affect change on firms’ ESG practices, investors need to engage over the long term rather than divest investment.
The effectiveness of asset owner and manager actions in tackling greenwashing by companies is seen as critical to the low-carbon transition. Reclaim Finance notes a “growing trend” within the investor community to condemn exclusion and divestment from heavy emitters as both “unrealistic and ineffective” tools to decarbonise the economy.
For ESG-aware investors, this paucity of solid information leads to questions over whether they should they wait for information flows to improve, pinning hope on further action from regulators or legislators, or divest their holdings to avoid uncertainty over the climate risks in their portfolios. Potential evidence of greenwashing.
In the statement it referred to metallurgical coal as “carbon steel materials”, drawing accusations of greenwashing. Divest or wind down? The company said it would continue the “responsible decline of its thermal coal operations over time”.
Alongside the progress of a bill in California calling for fossil fuel divestment by public-sector pensions, and the SEC’s plans for climate-risk disclosures , this new assault on greenwashing moves US policy closer to its European counterparts, where fund disclosure rules are already reshaping the market.
The increased scrutiny over greenwashing is necessary, and will provoke the market to favor substance over style. The divestment movement will wane. Sustainable Investing – Greater Scrutiny. The ESG (environmental, social and governance) brand is under attack from Republicans, reporters and returns.
Pressure to divest is commonly applied by ESG-conscious investors who no longer want to be associated with these companies or fund them. However, in practice, divestment is not the best strategy to enact change or to have a meaningful impact.
Joined-up commitments – If asset managers are likely to struggle to interpret firms’ holistic transition plans, how are they going to handle “meaningful, non-greenwashed, accountable, achievable net zero commitments”?
Were the sustainability measures and corporate social responsibility offices at VW simply engaged in greenwashing? The University of Michigan Endowment Fund: Divesting from Fossil Fuels (Published 9.9.2020) In September 2019, there were climate change strikes at the University of Michigan.
Ninety One has been among the first joiners of the World Benchmarking Alliance’s call on asset managers to review their approach to sustainable investing to ensure it does not unintentionally lead to divestment from EMs. Closing the gap Both public and private credit will be needed to address financing needs, Christ explained.
This resulted in concerns over greenwashing accusations and uncertainty surrounding the interpretation of sustainable investments. Initiatives such as divestment from fossil fuels, engagement with companies on sustainability issues, and the launch of dedicated ESG funds demonstrate their commitment to driving positive change.
CDPQ was deemed a climate leader, with the report highlighting the asset owner’s decision to divest of firms involved in oil production, refining and coal mining in 2022. Unrivalled ownership power The assessed pool included climate leaders and laggards, Shift found.
ESG investing has had to overcome numerous challenges, ranging from investor caution to multiple cases of greenwashing. It contrasted the negative performance against benchmarks resulting from divestment from fossil fuel firms with the positive relative returns achieved by funds not exposed to the sector in Q1 2020.
But Byrns sees divestment as unlikely outcome because American Century does a lot of work up front in finding companies that have well-defined improvement pathways relating to its KPIs, has consistent dialogues with the companies and has a long track record with its other strategies.
Perhaps more encouragingly, almost a fifth of shareholders voted in favour of resolutions calling on ExxonMobil and Shell to accurately disclose the role of asset transfers in their reported GHG emissions reductions, which would stop them claiming CO2 cuts from divestments.
These new requirements are part of a bigger push right across the economy for new standards on environmental reporting to weed out greenwashing and support our transition to a net zero financial system – for example, through our new Sustainability Disclosure Requirements ,” she said.
In addition to divesting from unethical stocks, you can make investments in companies that make a positive change in a practice called impact investing. Environment, However, companies might try to skip it and take on the aesthetic of a sustainable company without making any changes, a practice known as greenwashing.
The Impact Investing Principles have been really helpful, especially given the increased scrutiny of funds and concerns over greenwashing. London CIV has recently signed up to the Impact Investing Institute’s (III) Impact Investing Principles for Pensions , co-created with Pensions for Purpose. Impact through stewardship.
If divesting from harmful industries, communicate this publicly. Shareholder advocacy and engagement has certainly not been spared from the broader debate around widespread greenwashing in responsible investing. Vote shares and engage with investees and screen holdings on transparent ESG criteria. Collaboration as an enabler.
For investors, engaging with investee corporates in the transition process has replaced the blunt tool of divestment as a means of decarbonising portfolios. “But to actually implement it, we need to have methodologies in place and a change in approach.”. Engagement ring.
Large institutional investors have taken divergent approaches to managing the climate risks in their portfolios, with some pension funds divesting fossil fuel holdings. Nietsch agreed: “Nature issues tend to be so complex and systemic that divestment may have less of an effect than it might for climate.
Pledges and plans – This was a potentially significant week in the fight against greenwashing , with UN Climate Change unveiling its ‘ recognition and accountability framework ’ – essentially a tool for monitoring and verifying the net zero pledges of non-state actors – at its Bonn Climate Conference.
Greater impact of the regulation has yet to be seen, as we anticipate a wave of fund rebranding and divestments,” she said. In addition, in June, ESMA introduced a tool enabling to better identify cases of greenwashing in the investment management industry.
Greater impact of the regulation has yet to be seen, as we anticipate a wave of fund rebranding and divestments,” she said. In addition, in June, ESMA introduced a tool enabling to better identify cases of greenwashing in the investment management industry.
We organize all of the trending information in your field so you don't have to. Join 5,000+ users and stay up to date on the latest articles your peers are reading.
You know about us, now we want to get to know you!
Let's personalize your content
Let's get even more personalized
We recognize your account from another site in our network, please click 'Send Email' below to continue with verifying your account and setting a password.
Let's personalize your content