Tuesday, October 2, 2007

A Word of Advice for the Petitioners to the SEC on Climate Disclosure

Addendum to post below.
As fiduciaries you are exposing the owners of your portfolios to significant foreseeable risk if you have suspicions about the names in your portfolios and continue to hold them.

When my favorite counselor returns from hobnobbing at the St. Tropez Regatta (jeez, what am I doing at a keyboard?) I'll know more.

As things stand right now and being somewhat conversant with judicial and regulatory interpretations of the Prudent Man Rule*, there is liability.

Here's the list of fiduciary petitioners:

California Public Employees' Retirement
System

California State Controller,
John Chiang

California State Teachers’ Retirement System

California State Treasurer,
Bill Lockyer

F&C Management

Florida Chief Financial Officer,
Alex Sink

Kentucky State Treasurer,
Jonathan Miller

Maine State Treasurer,
David G. Lemoine

Maryland State Treasurer,
Nancy K. Kopp

New Jersey State Investment Council,
Orin Kramer, Chair

New York City Comptroller,
William C. Thompson, Jr.

The rest of the petitioners can be found at the Environmental Defense links below. This is going to be a messy process, huge amounts of money will be made and lost (Hundreds of billions? Trillions?), To misquote Betty Davis in "All About Eve": "Fasten your seatbelts, it's going to be a bumpy ride".

*Here are Justice Putnam's exact words:
Those with the responsibility to invest money for others should act with prudence, discretion, intelligence, and regard for the safety of capital as well as for income.