Institutional investors have played down the impact that President Trump's executive order to limit the power of proxy advisors will have on their investment processes, with pension funds suggesting proxy inputs only form a part of their voting decisions. However, the development feeds into an ongoing crimping of investor power.
A minority of pension funds reviewed for the GPTB publicly disclosure their organizational strategy in a way that goes beyond disclosures of economic and market conditions and the impact on the performance of their investments. Michael Reid argues there is room for improvement in communicating key corporate activities to stakeholders.
Comprehensive, holistic value disclosures and compelling communication are key benchmarks for pension funds. This has been confirmed by the first year experience working with leading global pension funds for the Global Pension Transparency Benchmark, a collaboration between Top1000funds.com and CEM Benchmarking. In year two, in recognition of this belief and communication excellence, we have decided to award bonus points to funds preparing Framework integrated annual reports. Mike Heale looks at four examples of pension funds already using the Framework.
For many boards net zero is the greatest investment governance challenge of all time, says the Inevitable Policy Response's Julian Poulter. He says a starting point for asset owner boards is a house view on the future, as opting for a standard asset allocation with a reliance on passive indices is unlikely to yield optimal results.
A group of major UK pension funds have committed to assessing diversity and inclusion as part of manager selection. Fund managers wanting to work with these clients will have to disclose information and demonstrate real devotion on how they are tackling diversity and inclusion within their workforce.
The CFA Institute's Future of Work in Investment Management report reveals the changes investment organisations are likely to make as they reassess the context of careers, work, and the culture of organizations, both in the near term and in the next five to 10 years. The report's author Rebecca Fender explains the key lessons.
As more asset owners and managers commit to net-zero strategies, Roger Urwin outlines the challenges for investors including these additional tasks adding to the already stretched asset owner governance budgets.
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Governance