Florida Pulls $2 Billion from ESG/WEF Gangster Socialists BlackRock

ESG is an investment philosophy that deemphasizes return on investment in favor of investing in leftwing grifts and boondoggles whether they earn a profit or not, or even if they just go bankrupt.

It's not a "political" move to pull public retirement funds out of ESG funds like BlackRock -- it ought to be the law that it's illegal to put them in BlackRock at all. Investment managers have no right, especially when handling people's retirement funds, to invest them in funds that de-emphasize actual investment growth in favor of pushing leftwing boondoggles like green energy.

Florida just did a very prudent thing.

Florida's Chief Financial Officer said on Thursday his department would pull $2 billion worth of its assets managed by BlackRock Inc (BLK.N), the biggest such divestment by a state opposed to the asset manager's environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) policies.

The move will hardly dent BlackRock's $8 trillion in assets and drew a strong response from the company, which said the action put politics over investor interests. Nonetheless it underscores how a backlash among many Republican leaders, such as those in Florida, against ESG investing, which they see as promoting a "woke agenda" is gathering steam.

Republicans are set to assume control of the U.S. House of Representatives in January. This will allow them to hold hearings on ESG and grill the chief executives of BlackRock and other major assets managers about their ESG policies, and also pressure regulators to scrutinize them.

In a statement, Florida CFO Jimmy Patronis said the state's Treasury, which he oversees, would remove BlackRock as manager of about $600 million of short-term investments and have its custodian freeze $1.43 billion of long-term securities now with BlackRock, with an eye on reallocating the money to other money managers by the start of 2023.

"Florida's Treasury Division is divesting from BlackRock because they have openly stated they've got other goals than producing returns," Patronis said in the statement provided by his office.

Asked about the move, BlackRock said in a statement that "We are disturbed by the emerging trend of political initiatives like this that sacrifice access to high-quality investments and thereby jeopardize returns, which will ultimately hurt Florida's citizens. Fiduciaries should always value performance over politics."

Dude, it's your own stated investment philosophy that puts politics over performance. The whole point of ESG is to free investment managers from having to pursue only old-fashioned concepts like "profit" and "safety," freeing them up to use other people's money to "fund the future" and "be the change we've been waiting for."

Larry Fink, head of BlackRock, is very loud about advertising his company's commitment to things other than investor security and profit -- until someone notices, then he lies and says his company is just all about sound investing.

BlackRock, a visible and loud voice in the index fund space, is placing a greater emphasis on sustainable investing. CEO, Larry Fink, expressed that his investment firm is increasingly integrating ESG issues into the investment decisions. He stated, "A company's ability to manage environmental, social and governance matters demonstrates the leadership and good governance that is so essential to sustainable growth."

Why should Florida's cops, teachers, and firemen have their retirement money being invested by a guy who seems interested in investing for every purpose except investor wealth?

Meanwhile:

posted by Ace at 02:50 PM

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