Posts by Sara Theiss
Financial outcomes from divesting from fossil fuels
Screening out fossil fuel stocks has not had a significant impact on returns for global, well-diversified portfolios — in fact over the past 12 years, an index without fossil fuels outperformed its most similar index with fossil fuels, and two separate studies by found that divestment actions taken by funds worldwide have passed the prudence tests required of fiduciaries. An additional academic study spanning decades that included previous oil price spikes found no significant difference in performance between portfolios with and without fossil fuels.
Read moreCity of Encinitas Tells CalPERS to Divest
On Wednesday, September 22, 2021, Encinitas City Council unanimously passed Resolution 67-2021 urging CalPERS to divest from fossil fuels.
Read moreCalPERS CIO Ben Meng Abruptly Resigns
CalPERS Chief Investment Officer (CIO), Ben Meng resigned unexpectedly on August 5, 2020, after only a year and a half on the job. He left just three days after the blog Naked Capitalism revealed potential conflicts of interest and other problems in forms (Form 700) he submitted in January 2019 and April of this year regarding his own investments.
Read morePrivate Prison Debate Reveals CalPERS’ Anti-Divestment Bias
After our 19 pro-divestment speakers presented brief, cogent, arguments at the March 18 CalPERS Investment Committee meeting in response to an update on Sustainable Investments from Managing Investment Director Beth Richtman, Dane Hutchings from the League of California Cities asserted that CalPERS should be laser-focused on returns and not invest in “rainbows and unicorns”. Chris…
Read moreCalPERS Watch: Sacramento, March 18
Fossil Fuel Investments Take a Dive In 2018, energy was the worst-performing sector on the SP500 stock index, losing almost 20 percent of its value. CalPERS has significant money invested in fossil fuels and has not revealed its losses, but the numbers don’t lie. By failing to divest from fossil fuels, the fund clearly…
Read moreCalPERS Explores Sustainable Development Goals
CalPERS devoted much of Day One of their recent offsite in Concord to presentations on sustainable investing, a topic of obvious interest to the Board…although the consequences of that interest don’t seem to have been reflected in actual investment decisions.
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