Jamie Hicks

This report compares millions of proxy voting records from January 2015 to June 2020 to commercial relationships, which uncovers the fact that all major fund managers considered — BlackRock, State Street, T. Rowe Price, and Vanguard — vote with management of their customers at a significantly higher rate compared to non-customers. Proxy voting biases favoring clients occurred at all four asset managers on management resolutions and occurred at three of the four asset managers; environmental, social, and governance (ESG) resolutions; and climate-related resolutions. The bottom line is that proxy voting by major asset managers favors their clients — a clear conflict of interest. More stringent reporting requirements and new technological and policy solutions should be implemented to remove proxy voting conflicts of interest and allow shareholder interests, as intended, to be the primary driver of proxy voting.

Over the past five years, PMI has made monumental progress in achieving its purpose of delivering a smoke-free future by replacing cigarettes with smoke-free products to the benefit of adults who would otherwise continue to smoke. Its 2020 Integrated Report communicates how the fundamental transformation of PMI’s business, governance, performance and ambitious targets create value for its shareholders and stakeholders in the short, medium and long-term. The company continues to progress toward its mission to accelerate the end of smoking with aims to make its smoke-free products available in 100 markets in 2025, up from more than 60 today. Additionally, it has increased its ambition of the contribution of its smoke-free products to total net revenues of more than 50 percent by 2025, meaning that in five years, cigarettes account for less than half of PMI’s total net revenues. Further accelerating PMI’s transformation, PMI announced a new ambition this year of at least USD 1 billion in annual net revenues from ‘beyond nicotine’ products in 2025. Find out how PMI is progressing toward accelerating the end of smoking and download the report.Find out more

The Role of Natural Climate Solutions in Corporate Climate Commitments: A Brief for Investors is a first-of-its-kind engagement tool for investors to spur meaningful dialogue with companies on the role and use of natural climate solutions in delivering on those commitments. It provides clear guidance on how to facilitate engagements with portfolio companies and lays out expectations for climate disclosures—calling for transparency in critical steps along the way to net zero. 

In this full-length PDF version of an RI Long Read article, Duncan Austin argues that the need for net zero reveals there have been two interpretations of sustainability all along.Four decades after sustainability first emerged as a concept, we are witnessing a critical ‘net zero moment’. First gradually, and now suddenly, companies are making ‘net zero’ pledges to reduce carbon emissions in line with the Paris Agreement. This represents a substantial and welcome upgrade of ambition regarding climate change, but poses the obvious challenge. In March 2021, a survey by Standard Chartered found that 64 percent of senior corporate executives do not believe that net zero commitments are commercially viable, contradicting the longstanding ESG narrative that ecological sustainability is a ‘win-win’ – good for profit and planet.Download the PDF to read the article.

Low-Wage Workers Lost Hours, Jobs, and Lives. Their Employers Bent the Rules — To Pump up CEO Paychecks.

Two years after investors representing more than $11 trillion in assets called on six of the largest fast-food companies to mitigate climate and water risks in their meat and dairy supply chains, five of those fast food chains (McDonald’s, Yum! Brands, Chipotle, Domino’s and Wendy’s) have either set, or stated they will set, science-based emission reduction targets (SBTs).

Although the increasing interest in impact investing is encouraging, concerns regarding “greenwashing” remain. For this reason, it is important that general partners and limited partners alike give careful thought as to which tools will best support their impact objectives and align incentives.

Tools of Change: 2021 Calvert Engagement Report

Kellogg Company (NYSE: K) 2020 Annual Report