In an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall exposes the behavior of big financial institutions that have created what could be described as an ESG cartel. He writes:
Proponents of ESG—environmental, social and governance—investing are posing as champions of the free market. Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes and I testified earlier this month before the House Oversight Committee regarding our continuing investigations into several global financial alliances that aim to impose ESG policies on American businesses and consumers in defiance of our free-market economy.
Minutes into the hearing, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D., Md.) claimed that my colleagues and I were “assaulting the free market” and attempting to “stop the market from responding to the climate crisis.” Rep. Katie Porter (D., Calif.) continued the gaslighting, noting that “capitalism delivers freedom,” which “happens when markets let people choose what they want.”
As Mr. Raskin and Ms. Porter surely know, the free market has resisted onerous ESG mandates. That’s why sectorwide financial alliances have emerged to restrict the market’s functioning and stymie consumer choice.
A company’s affinity for ESG ideology is its prerogative. Likewise, it is the consumer’s choice to reward a company’s social messages with continued business. Such corporate stances are often nothing more than virtue signaling. This can often be a costly decision, as Anheuser-Busch is learning in the wake of Bud Light’s partnership with transgender activist Dylan Mulvaney.
The more sinister ESG acolytes, however, aren’t merely printing woke messages on six-packs. America’s self-proclaimed “socially responsible” financial institutions, which should be competing in the free market, are instead joining forces with one another and their global counterparts to decide which companies—and, in some cases, which industries—should be permitted to continue their market participation unimpeded.
Since 2017, a growing number of these financial alliances, including Climate Action 100+, the Net-Zero Banking Alliance and the Venture Climate Alliance, have plotted to pressure blacklisted companies into making a priority of decarbonization and other social goals at the behest of the United Nations, not American consumers. In other words, by controlling trillions of dollars in assets, these groups intend to corner the market through potentially illegal horizontal agreements and force preferred social and political objectives on American companies and consumers.
The Net Zero Asset Managers initiative boasts 301 signatories and $59 trillion in assets under management. On its website, the group writes: “Our industry’s ability to drive the transition to net zero is extremely powerful. Without our industry on board, the goals set out in the Paris Agreement will be difficult to meet.”
Action Line: Investors aren’t hiring money managers to “drive the transition to net zero.” They’re hiring them to generate compound interest in the hopes of pursuing a wonderful retirement life. When you’re ready to work with someone who puts your interests first, let’s talk.
