Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond is among more than two dozen attorneys general demanding answers from financial firms over their ESG policies. Drummond and attorneys general from Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska and other states claimed the firms approved environmental policies over the concerns of their shareholders.
The lengthy demand letter was sent to 25 large firms whose asset manageres voted 75% or more of the time with Institutional Shareholder Services recommendations “for” environmental proposals flagged by the pro-green activist group Ceres.
“The Asset Managers’ support for these shareholder proposals was over twice as high as the overall market, which supported them only 37% of the time, and only 17% of these proposals received majority support,” wrote Drummond and the other attorneys general.
“Given this wide disparity, we are concerned that the Asset Managers may have outsourced their voting in this area to ISS or another third party and are failing to carry out their fiduciary duties, so we are writing to request information about whether the Asset Managers’disproportionate support for ISS recommendations was consistent with their fiduciary duties.”
He and 23 other attorneys general sent the letter. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, one of those who signed the letter told Fox News said the intent is to learn whether the the financial firms “outsourced their due diligence” to a non-fiduciary entity whose agenda is more aligned with Washington Democrats and the green movement than their own stockholders.
” There are significant reasons to believe that ISS was not conducting financial analyses of these proposals but rather following a presumption of recommending in favor of them,” wrote Drummond and the other attorneys general.
“Moreover, ISS’s benchmark policy makes no mention of financial analysis of specific environmental shareholder proposals, which suggests that ISS is not evaluating these proposals on their specific financial merits to ensure they are in the shareholders’ financial interest.”
The following firms received letters of inquiry:
Abrdn
Legal & General Investment Management
Allianz Global Investors
M&G Investments
Allspring Global Investments
Manulife Investment Management
Amundi Asset Management
Morgan Stanley
AQR Capital Management
Mutual of America Capital Management Corp.
Aviva Investors
Northern Trust
AXA Investment Managers
Principal Global Investors LLC
BMO Global Asset Management
ProShares & ProFund Advisors LLC
D.E. Shaw Investment Management
TD Asset Management
Gateway Investment Advisers, LLC
Thrivent Investment Management, Inc.
Guggenheim Investments
UBS Asset Management Americas
HSBC Global Asset Management
Wilmington Trust Investment Management
IndexIQ Advisors LLC
