Florida threat to BlackRock ESG
The US state of Florida has said it will pull US$2 billion worth of its assets from BlackRock, the world’s biggest fund manager which manages or holds shares in many New Zealand companies.
Monday, December 5th 2022, 2:01PM
by Andrea Malcolm
The US state accuses the mega investor of putting ESG over investor interests. BlackRock has responded by saying the threat puts politics over investor interests.
The divestment, the largest by a US state opposed to ESG, would barely impact the firm which manages US$8 trillion in assets. In a statement, the Florida CFO said the state’s Treasury would remove BlackRock as the manager of about US$600 million of short-term investments and have its custodian freeze US$1.43 billion of long term securities with BlackRock and start reallocating to other fund managers at the start of next year.
BlackRock, the world’s biggest money manager, also faces scathing criticism from ESG and RI advocates for not carrying through on its stated ESG policies. In the 2021 US AGM season, BlackRock supported 43 percent of ESG motions by US shareholders. This fell to 24 percent, this year The Financial Times reported.
BlackRock reaches deep into New Zealand’s financial environment. In New Zealand, BlackRock underpins most retail funds, has mandates over the New Zealand Super Fund, fund management partnerships with ASB and AMP and shares in NZX listed companies including Spark, SkyCity and Fisher & Paykel Healthcare. In September it bought solar battery company solarZero for more than
$100 million.
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