From FT Alphaville:
Aggregate ESG confusionThe latest Deutsche raid highlights what a mess this has become
It’s tempting to sigh “it’s always Deutsche” on news that 50 German police earlier today raided DB and its asset management unit DWS over greenwashing claims. The reality is that the whole ESG edifice is a mess.Here’s Bloomberg’s scoop on the raids:DWS has been facing the allegations since its former chief sustainability officer, Desiree Fixler, went public with them in August, prompting regulatory probes in the US and Germany. While DWS has denied the claims, the raid adds to a list of regulatory and legal issues for Deutsche Bank Chief Executive Officer Christian Sewing just as he emerges from a successful turnround of the lender. DWS shares fell as much as 4.6% on the news and Deutsche Bank declined as much as 2.3%. Among other things, Fixler has said that DWS’s claims that hundreds of billions of its assets under management were “ESG integrated” were misleading because the label didn’t translate into meaningful action by relevant fund managers. DWS has since stopped using the label.In a statement DWS said: “We have continuously co-operated fully with all relevant regulators and authorities on this matter and will continue to do so.” Of course, DB has some form when it comes to regulatory infractions, but if it is guilty of unlawful greenwashing then there are likely a lot of investment groups that should feel uneasy.
The problem is that ESG — as a whole, and each of the E, S and G individually — is an unholy mess of subjective assessments based on patchy arbitrary data that allows anyone to say they are ESG compliant....
....MUCH MORE
Possibly also of interest:- Professor Damodaren Writes About War and ESG
- ESG Heresy Triggers Shock & Horror... And About Time!
- Elon and ESG
- ESG: The Swiss National Bank May Be Forced To Sell Some Stocks
The great thing about ESG is that the definitions are so vague it can be practically anything you want it to be.That was October 2020. There are many more.
This is one of the reasons the largest of the asset gatherers, the BlackRock's of the world, and the indexers, the S&P's, are so attracted to those three little letters, they want to be the arbiters of what can carry the imprimatur.
It's also a very au courant product to sell.
