Posted on 11/22/2022 1:38:46 PM PST by Oldeconomybuyer
(Reuters) - President Joe Biden's administration on Tuesday reversed restrictions imposed under his predecessor Donald Trump on retirement plans considering environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors such as climate change and racial justice when selecting investments.
The Labor Department announced a final rule first proposed last year after Biden, a Democrat, ordered government agencies to assess climate-related risk to retirement and pension investments.
The rule will make it easier for retirement plans to invest in socially responsible funds and companies, though it requires investment decisions to be based on traditional financial factors. The rule, which the department said covers plans that collectively invest $12 trillion, takes effect 60 days after it is formally published, which could be as soon as this week.
Biden's administration rescinded regulations adopted in 2020 under Trump, a Republican, that allowed retirement plans to consider only financial factors and not social responsibility in making investment decisions and exercising shareholder rights.
The Labor Department said the Trump-era rules, which had been criticized by business groups and the financial industry, failed to account for the positive impact that ESG considerations can have on long-term investment returns.
The new rule also allows plan fiduciaries to consider ESG factors when proxy voting on behalf of shareholders.
(Excerpt) Read more at usnews.com ...
So now granny can go woke and go broke, too, whether she likes it or is aware of it or not.
lengthy, but worth reading for those who are unfamiliar with the history of ESG.
2018: Forbes: The Remarkable Rise Of ESG
by Georg Kell
The term ESG was first coined in 2005 in a landmark study entitled “Who Cares Wins.” Today, ESG investing is estimated at over $20 trillion in AUM or around a quarter of all professionally managed assets around the world, and its rapid growth builds on the Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) movement that has been around much longer. But unlike SRI, which is based on ethical and moral criteria and uses mostly negative screens, such as not investing in alcohol, tobacco or firearms, ESG investing is based on the assumption that ESG factors have financial relevance...
The story of ESG investing began in January 2004 when former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan wrote to over 50 CEOs of major financial institutions, inviting them to participate in a joint initiative under the auspices of the UN Global Compact and with the support of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the Swiss Government. The goal of the initiative was to find ways to integrate ESG into capital markets. A year later this initiative produced a report entitled “Who Cares Wins,” with Ivo Knoepfel as the author...
Among the many ESG factors that are viewed as having financial relevance are especially those related to climate change. The reason for this is that climate change is no longer a distant threat on the horizon, but one that is here and now, with multi-billion-dollar economic consequences. Many investor initiatives are now pushing for de-carbonization and the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) has given much impetus for improving risk preparedness and, by implication, de-carbonization actions...
https://www.forbes.com/sites/georgkell/2018/07/11/the-remarkable-rise-of-esg/
About the writer: Georg Kell
I am Chairman of the Board of Arabesque, a technology company that uses AI and big data to assess sustainability performance relevant for investment analysis and decision making. I am also Co-Chairman of the DWS ESG Advisory Board and Speaker of the Volkswagen Sustainability Council.
I am the founding Director of the United Nations Global Compact, the world’s largest corporate sustainability initiative. During my career of almost three decades at the United Nations, working directly with former Secretary Generals Kofi Annan and Ban Ki-moon, I built the UN Global Compact and oversaw the launch if its sister initiatives, including the Principles for Responsible Investing (PRI), the Principles for Responsible Management Education (PRME), and the Sustainable Stock Exchanges (SSE).
I started my career as a research fellow in engineering at the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Technology and Innovation in Berlin. I then worked as a financial analyst in various African and Asian countries before joining the United Nations in 1987. A native of Germany, I hold advanced degrees in economics and engineering from the Technical University of Berlin.
Dems will make it a requirement in the lame duck session. Biden will sign it.
When the great reckoning for the great lie that is the climate change hoax comes to pass, these idiots will be broke.
—”I’m sure they did but we’ll never hear about it.”
Large lumps under the rug tend to be talked about.
Ontario Teachers writes off FTX stake, taking $95-million loss
Second time in three months that a major Canadian pension manager has been forced to write off a crypto investment
https://financialpost.com/fp-finance/ontario-teachers-writes-off-ftx-stake-taking-95-million-loss
Can we say FTX, boys & girls?
Get woke, go broke!
Isn’t he satisfied with what he’s already done to my 401K?
There go our retirement investments.
Bump
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