Rakhi Kumar

State Street Global Advisors, the asset management business of State Street Corporation (NYSE: STT) has published major new research outlining the key push and pull factors for environmental, social and governance (ESG) principles adoption across 300 institutional investors globally^[1] .

Top push factors – drivers of ESG adoption – include a need to meet fiduciary duty and regulations, followed by ESG risks management for the portfolio. Top pull factors – inhibitors of ESG adoption – include a lack of reliable and consistent ESG data, followed by resourcing or cost issues associated with internal integration, infrastructure, knowledge building and a lack of available ESG talent to manage integration.

Top factors pushing ESG adoption: fiduciary duty, regulation and risk mitigation

The research reveals that key drivers or ‘push’ factors for financial institutions are jointly fiduciary duty and a growing regulatory environment; each cited as top push factors by 46 percent of respondents.

“That fiduciary duty was cited so highly marks a significant development since many investors previously struggled with whether ESG adoption runs contrary to their fiduciary objectives,” said Rakhi Kumar, Head of ESG Investments and Asset Stewardship at State Street Global Advisors. “Alongside regulation, this is now a major driver of ESG implementation.”

For respondents who noted fiduciary duty as their primary consideration, their next and highest ranked drivers – both at 40 percent – were requirements for ethical and social responsibility on behalf of their clients and a desire to mitigate ESG-related risks.

Regional differences exist in the key drivers pushing ESG adoption. At 59 percent, the importance of fiduciary duty was more pronounced in North America compared to EMEA and Asia-Pacific while the region’s next greatest concern, at 48 percent, was keeping up with the market’s standard-setters.

Within EMEA, regulatory shifts were the clear top ‘push’ factor closely followed by a desire to mitigate against ESG and reputational risks at 52 percent, 45 percent and 39 percent respectively.

Meanwhile, primary drivers for Asia-Pacific investors include mitigation of ESG risks at 47 percent, fiduciary risk at 38 percent and pressure from beneficiaries at 37 percent.

“The research results confirm what we’re hearing from our clients,” commented Ben Colton, APAC Head of Asset Stewardship at State Street Global Advisors. “The regulatory environment is clearly driving institutional investors towards a sea-change in ESG practices. Over the past year most of our clients have explored what they can do about their portfolios’ carbon profiles and climate-related risks.”

Across all regions, outperformance is considered a less significant ESG adoption driver than risk mitigation.

Top ESG pull factors: the data challenge, resources and expertise

Several significant ‘pull’ factors continue to hold ESG adoption back. The chief deterrent cited was the unreliability and inconsistency of ESG data, with 44 percent highlighting these data challenges as a primary concern.

Weightings ascribed to each ‘pull’ factor vary according to the type of institution in question. Pension funds are most likely to cite an availability of reliable ESG data as their top concern (47 percent).

However, a large proportion of sovereign wealth funds (69 percent) view internal resource costs as a deterrent, which indicates partnership opportunities between sovereign wealth funds and asset managers to collaborate on ESG planning.

The top three push factors were highly clustered with the second factor, internal resource constraints and costs at 43 percent. This was closely followed at 40 percent by a lack of expertise as one of the most significant limiting factors to implementing ESG.

Given the growing prominence of ESG as a materially significant portfolio consideration, an unsurprising 95 percent of respondents signaled their intention to hire more ESG specialists in the next three years. The remaining 5 percent intend to encourage their staff to become more familiar with the concept.

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[1] State Street Global Advisors Research Report: Into the Mainstream – ESG at the Tipping Point (November 2019)

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Rakhi Kumar

State Street Global Advisors, the asset management business of State Street Corporation (NYSE: STT), has announced its latest impact figures for the Fearless Girl campaign, demonstrating continued progress for the firm’s gender diversity asset stewardship programs in the US, UK, Australia, Japan, Canada and continental Europe.

Since the introduction of Fearless Girl in 2017, more than 300 companies identified by State Street Global Advisors responded to the firm’s call by adding a female director and another 28 have committed to do so. In the United States alone the campaign continues to build momentum as a total of 215 companies added a female director. This resulted in a decrease in the percentage of companies in the Russell 3000 Index^[1] without a female director from 24 percent at the end of 2016 to 16 percent at June 2018^[2] . During the 2017 proxy season State Street Global Advisors voted against 512 companies for failing to take action regarding their board gender diversity, and in the first half of 2018, through several country proxy voting seasons, voted against 581 companies.

“As stalwart practitioners and believers in the value of asset stewardship, we are proud to see the influence of Fearless Girl continue to grow,” said Rakhi Kumar, head of ESG Investments and Asset Stewardship for State Street Global Advisors. “Since her arrival, Fearless Girl has inspired companies and shareholders worldwide to focus on board diversity and join us in our call to action. We commend the companies that have already placed women on their boards in response to our outreach, and the others that have committed to doing so.”

In the last year State Street Global Advisors has expanded its engagement program around the world, rolling out initiatives in Japan, Canada, and Europe. Japan, in particular, has seen early momentum leading to 40 companies taking action and adding a female director as well as 11 more committing to doing so in the near future. In Canada almost a quarter, 23 percent, of companies are taking action by adding a female director and in Europe, 50 percent of companies identified have already added a female director.

“As the world’s third-largest asset manager, and one of the largest index managers, we are focused on providing our clients with long-term value and investing responsibly to help them achieve their financial goals,” said Cyrus Taraporevala, State Street Global Advisors president and chief executive officer. “Our commitment to asset stewardship exemplifies that focus as we firmly believe these issues should form part of an integrated investment approach.”

The firm also announced an enhancement to its board gender diversity voting guidelines designed to further encourage companies to diversify their boards. Starting in 2020 in the US, UK and Australian markets, and in 2021 in Japan, Canada and continental Europe, State Street Global Advisors will vote against the entire slate of board members on the nominating committee if a company does not have at least one woman on its board, and has not engaged in successful dialogue on State Street Global Advisors’ board gender diversity program for three consecutive years.

North America

• The Board gender diversity campaign momentum continued in the US this year building on the strong program in 2017. This has resulted in a total of 816 companies being identified since the launch of the Fearless Girl campaign
• Many of the Russell 3000 companies initially targeted in 2017 have since added at least one female director, driving the percentage of companies on the index without a female director to decrease from 24% in 2016 to 16% as of June 30, 2018^[3]
• Since the launch, 215 US companies have added female directors to their boards, while an additional 14 have committed to making those additions in the near term
• Canadian response to the campaign has also been strong, with 23% of identified companies adding a female director or committing to do so.

Asia Pacific

• Japan stood out for early momentum as 18% of targeted companies added a female director, or pledged to do so.
• Australian companies were similarly enthusiastic, with 49% of targeted companies adding women or committing to add women to their boards since the start of the campaign.

Europe

• In the UK, State Street Global Advisors continued to monitor the remaining few companies on the FTSE 350^[4] that were lacking in board gender diversity. Of the 12 companies identified, seven have added their first woman to the board of directors since Fearless Girl’s original placement.
• Elsewhere in Europe, since expanding the campaign to include the STOXX 600^[5] , the company has identified just 10 companies without a female director—of those, five have subsequently added their first female board member.

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[1] Russell 3000 Index is a market-capitalization-weighted equity index maintained by the FTSE Russell that provides exposure to the entire “stock market. The index tracks the performance of the 3,000 largest U.S.-traded stocks which represent about 98% of all U.S incorporated equity securities.
[2] ISS Analytics as of November 2016; June 2018
[3] ISS Analytics as of November 2016; June 2018
[4] The FTSE 350 Index is a market capitalisation weighted stock market index incorporating the largest 350 companies by capitalisation which have their primary listing on the London Stock Exchange. It is a combination of the FTSE 100 Index of the largest 100 companies and the FTSE 250 Index of the next largest 250.
[5] The STOXX Europe 600 Index is derived from the STOXX Europe Total Market Index (TMI) and is a subset of the STOXX Global 1800 Index. With a fixed number of 600 components, the STOXX Eu

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