Last month, the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) added 27 signatories to its Stewardship Code bringing its total coverage to 277 capital providers and an aggregate assets under management of £44.6trn. Despite its narrow applicability to investing on behalf of UK savers and pensioners, the Stewardship Code has set something of a global benchmark for responsible … Read more
For an industry that is such a big proponent of corporate transparency, we continue to face challenges around transparency about voting. Last year, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) sought to tackle this by establishing the Vote Reporting Group, whose mission is to create a comprehensive and centralised proxy voting reporting framework within the UK … Read more
Investors in Asia would like to see greater transparency and more disclosure on decarbonisation from the steel sector in order to give them confidence to allocate capital to the appropriate companies and projects in the region. This is one of the takeaways from a roundtable convened in October by the Asia Investor Group on Climate … Read more
The Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ) has launched a Latin America and Caribbean Network to drive net-zero progress in the region. Latin America and the Caribbean contribute less than 10% of global greenhouse gas emissions yet is considered one of the most vulnerable regions to a diverse set of climate-related risks. However, according … Read more
Workforce conditions and supply chains are among the issues that the Taskforce on Social Factors’ (TSF) has highlighted in their latest guidance, aimed at helping pension trustees better consider and incorporate social factors into their investment and stewardship decision-making. The guide includes more than 30 recommendations for the UK pensions sector about how it can … Read more
Sometimes a memory of a moment creeps up on you when you least expect it. For me that happened on train reading a PDF a few weeks ago – nothing particularly new there, many of us only get to read on public transport away from the stream of notifications. You might be familiar with this … Read more
Digital options for voting in AGMs and engaging in banking services can broaden participation in those areas, and help companies work towards the UN sustainable development goal (SDG) of financial inclusion. Sustainable development goal 8 explicitly targets financial inclusion – measured by the number of ATMs accessible to the public, and the proportion of adults … Read more
Mark Manning, technical specialist for sustainable finance and stewardship at the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), has announced he is leaving the regulator to set up an advisory business. In a LinkedIn post, Manning (pictured) said he was “moving on” at the end of the year to launch New Paradigm Advisory, a business “dedicated to helping … Read more
The Treasury Committee held its first oral evidence session for the Sexism in the City campaign on Tuesday (17 October), which aims to tackle the obstacles women face in the financial industry. The panel included Baroness Helena Morrissey, chair of the Diversity project; Fiona Mackenzie, CEO of The Other Half, Alesha De-Freitas, head of policy, … Read more
Waverton’s senior multi-asset and sustainability analyst Paris Jordan is leaving her role to become head of responsible investing at Charles Stanley. Jordan has worked at Waverton for almost three years, being responsible for idea generation, portfolio construction and the responsible investing assessment of more than £2bn of third-party funds. She also led ESG integration for … Read more