Institutional Impact
Photo by Mathieu Stern on Unsplash
Institutional Impact | November 20, 2023
Making impact real, or: How I learned to stop worrying and love values investing
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of the …
Even before the Maui fires, 2023 had seen a record 15 confirmed weather and climate disaster events with losses exceeding $1 billion each.
Institutional Impact | August 28, 2023
Wall Street CEOs fiddle while Maui burns (and the world bakes)
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
Institutional Impact | July 18, 2023
For ESG Month, let’s have an honest discussion about the limits of shareholder engagement
Move over infrastructure week. On Capitol Hill, it’s ESG month! It’s hard for me, too, to contain my excitement. Environmental, social and governance …
Return on Inclusion | July 10, 2023
Insight Partners secures $118 million to invest in diverse fund managers
ImpactAlpha, July 10 — New York-based Insight Partners launched 20/20 Vision Capital after the summer of unrest following the murder of George Floyd. …
Institutional Impact | June 5, 2023
Forget ESG. The greening of the global economy is a boon for institutional investors.
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
photo: World Economic Forum
Institutional Impact | March 16, 2023
In Larry Fink’s letter to investors, ESG is the business imperative that dare not speak its name
ImpactAlpha, March 16 – Don’t expect BlackRock to back off from ESG any time soon. Even if the acronym appears nowhere in chairman …
Institutional Impact | February 22, 2023
University of California’s rescue of Blackstone’s REIT exposes rot at the core of institutional asset management
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
Newly elected Speaker of the US House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy
Institutional Impact | January 11, 2023
GOP ditches ‘pro-business’ with attacks on ESG that hurt corporations, investors – and red states
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and …
Institutional Impact | November 22, 2022
Beware of paper billionaires bearing gifts, and other lessons of the FTX implosion
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of the …
Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard. Credit: Patagonia
Institutional Impact | October 12, 2022
How Patagonia’s private plan for the public good inadvertently reveals the limits of impact investing
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of the …
Institutional Impact | September 19, 2022
Walmart heir’s foundation joins small club aligning endowment with mission
The foundation of Walmart heir Lukas Walton has reached its goal of aligning 90% of its $1 billion endowment with its philanthropic initiative. …
Institutional Impact | September 1, 2022
My summer fun: Parsing the proposals to regulate ESG
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of the …
Institutional Impact | July 13, 2022
ESG and its discontents: A defense of HSBC banker Stuart Kirk and a critique of ESG orthodoxy
Stuart Kirk has had enough. Last week, Kirk resigned as HSBC’s head of sustainability, saying his position had become unsustainable. The news wasn’t …
Institutional Impact | July 7, 2022
The politics and power of asset management lead straight to the U.S. Supreme Court
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and …
Washington, D.C. | Photo credit: Drew Petrimoulx
Institutional Impact | May 24, 2022
Tracing a line from the lack of diversity in asset management to the undoing of Roe v. Wade
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
Vladimir Putin and EN+ Group's Oleg Deripaska
Institutional Impact | April 11, 2022
The curious case of the U.S. ESG critic at the head of a Russian aluminum conglomerate
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
Institutional Impact | March 15, 2022
Divestment gets a reboot as global investors dump Russian assets
The scenes of brutal shelling and bombardment, along with heroic resistance and popular protests, have triggered a global response of solidarity and support. …
Institutional Impact | February 14, 2022
If crypto is the Wild West of finance, impact investing is the country club
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and …
Institutional Impact | February 3, 2022
Race to the Top: How responsible asset allocators are investing for a better world
This post by Scott Kalb of New America is in response to “O Canada, how do your pension plans get high ESG scores …
Alberta Tar Sands | Photo credit: Russ Heinl
Institutional Impact | January 24, 2022
O Canada, how do your pension plans get high ESG scores when you’re up to your neck in tar-sands oil?
When in doubt, publish a list. It’s a media truism. The trick works for not-for-profits too. New America, a Washington D.C. think tank, …
Institutional Impact | January 5, 2022
Long live ESG! ESG is dead! ESG is… stepping up?
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
A video grab from footage broadcast by the UK Parliament's Parliamentary Recording Unit (PRU) shows former Yorkshire cricketer Azeem Rafiq testifying in front of a Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) Committee in London | Photo credit: AFP PHOTO / PRU
Institutional Impact | December 16, 2021
Not Cricket: Diversity in asset management must be more than woke signaling
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
Institutional Impact | November 8, 2021
Oil and inflation challenge green investors, as what goes down does come up
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
Alok Sharma, President of COP26 | Photo credit: Cubankite
Institutional Impact | October 14, 2021
Keep Calm and Carry On: The British are coming for climate change (so long as their asset managers do the heavy lifting)
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and …
Enbridge Line 3 pipeline | Photo credit: THE CANADIAN PRESS/John Woods
Institutional Impact | September 16, 2021
Target Enbridge, not Exxon, to prevent the lock-in of high-carbon infrastructure
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
Photo credit: YAKOBCHUK VIACHESLAV
Institutional Impact | September 6, 2021
Some of pension funds’ spectacular returns are coming at the expense of their own beneficiaries
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
Institutional Impact | August 16, 2021
Speaking truth to power should not be career suicide for ESG professionals
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and strategies of …
James Coulter, co-founder of TPG Capital | Photo credit: CNBC
Institutional Impact | July 19, 2021
The education of Jim Coulter, or: How private equity learned to stop worrying and love ESG
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and …
Empire State Building in New York City | Photo by William Wachter on Unsplash
Institutional Impact | June 15, 2021
Another election, another flurry of climate activity from New York City’s pension plans
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and …
Bill McGlashan
Institutional Impact | May 25, 2021
In a world where fairness is in short supply, a star’s fall isn’t enough to redeem private equity
Editor’s note: Contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, continues her bi-weekly column, Institutional Impact, exploring the policies, practices …
Future Investment Initiative conference in Riyadh in 2017 | Photo credit: AFP
Institutional Impact | May 10, 2021
How do you solve a problem like MBS? Saudi Arabia presents a governance risk impact investors can’t ignore
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and …
Institutional Impact | April 26, 2021
Sustainability is at risk when asset managers are the judge, jury and executors of the ESG agenda
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, contributes a bi-weekly column on the policies, practices and …
UC chief investment officer Jagdeep Singh Bachher | Photo credit: UC
Institutional Impact | April 5, 2021
‘Fossil-fuel free’ endowments and pension funds are rarely free of fossil fuels. Here’s why that’s a problem.
Editor’s note: Contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, continues her bi-weekly column, Institutional Impact, exploring the policies, practices …
Institutional Impact | March 16, 2021
Why pension funds and other Amazon investors are backing the workers in union battle
Editor’s note: ImpactAlpha contributing editor Imogen Rose-Smith, a longtime senior writer for Institutional Investor, is kicking off a bi-weekly column on the policies, …