ESG

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It started more as a form of activism, then developed into a trend that everyone would jump on before turning into a monster whose tamers have completely resigned. With European regulations and a zealous auditing spirit, companies’ sustainability work has been driven to be about decimal points and regulatory compliance, instead of adding shareholder value or social and environmental benefits. As the EU Commission says ‘stop, change and do things right’, the time has come for communicators and IROs to reclaim the concept of sustainability. When we write the history of corporate communication up to and into the 2010s, the…

What does DEI mean to you? Here at IR Impact, we’ve stopped spelling out diversity, equity and inclusion, working under the assumption that this most tricky of news items is known to all. But it seems that other interpretations exist – on the White House official X account for example, where a post was recently put out stating ‘the only DEI we support is Deport Every Illegal’. That very much sums up the kind of narrative companies are up against with today’s very public broadly anti-ESG and specifically anti-DEI rhetoric.

When Robert Eccles wrote a piece called Grift capitalism: The GOP’s brilliant strategy for ripping off ordinary Americans, it received the usual dose of online hate mail. It also led to a challenge: if you can find a conservative that thinks sustainability is good for capital markets, will you stop ‘writing nasty stuff’ about Republicans? That led him to the position he speaks from today: a liberal ex-hippy who has found common ground with the so-called ‘eco right’. Eccles, a well-known author and lecturer who has been writing about non-financial metrics since the early 1970s, had already become frustrated with…

Whether ESG is over or increasingly relevant, in need of reform or greater standardization is the great debate. Has the term become too ‘woke’? Is it too much of a political hot potato? Does good ESG equate to better share price performance, or has it been hijacked under the pretense of improving returns? Prabh Banga of Aecon Group (left) and Jack Mintz from the University of Calgary (middle) debate ESG with IR Impact’s Steve Wade These were the topics up for debate when Prabh Banga, vice president of sustainability at Aecon Group and Jack Mintz, president’s fellow of the school…

When a corporate scandal breaks, the first question investors ask is Where were the directors? This phrase was coined by Peter Dey in 1994 when he led a report on how to improve corporate governance practices at Canadian listed companies. Corporate scandals have always existed and many stem from weak corporate governance, often caused by a lack of communication, insufficient internal controls or a very lax attitude towards potential problems. In 2024, the US administration criticized Boeing’s board for failing to adequately supervise the safety procedures of its aircraft, following several accidents involving its 737 Max model that resulted in…

Amid the debate on what companies should or shouldn’t be doing on ESG, some things remain crystal clear: understanding and addressing business externalities is essential, and issues that affect the bottom line cannot be ignored. Deforestation is one of these. Investors and IR professionals are concerned about climate change, and increasingly about nature loss. More […]

In the dynamic landscape of financial decision-making, the importance of non-financial objectives – encapsulated in ESG criteria – has become central for governments, corporations and investors. Even as recent forecasts project a significant increase in ESG-related assets under management, concerns about the potential impact on returns persist. That has significant implications for IR professionals, who […]

Almost a third of North American IROs cite political action as main driver of anti-ESG sentiment, finds IR Intel research

Investors’ expectations around ESG factors have always been multifaceted. And with regulations and guidelines for ESG disclosure becoming only more stringent, there is evidence attitudes are changing around ESG that will affect how shareholders make their voting and investment decisions in the future. Ahead of the upcoming ESG Integration Forum – Summer, taking place in […]

In 2021, three quarters of IR Magazine cover stories focused on ESG. We looked at how companies were increasingly tying executive compensation to ESG, explored the ways in which ESG was being integrated into sell-side research and examined how ESG was shaping corporate reporting. Of course, IR Magazine has long covered ESG issues – just […]

NYU Stern Business School professor, summer must-have author and LinkedIn influencer on the problems with ESG and the big questions that still need to be answered

Blue-chip companies spend big bucks on social programs. Apple, for example, recently increased its budget for its diversity program alone from $100 mn to $200 mn, while Mercedes Group spent €97 mn ($104 mn) on training in 2023, up from €93 mn the year before. The areas normally included under the S pillar of ESG are […]

Recently, the head of ESG at a blue-chip asset manager that is paying more than $200,000 annually for ESG data told me: ‘Once we get this ton of data from a major data provider, our work just begins. We have to make some financial sense of it.’ His remark points to a fundamental problem with […]

Investors are setting their sights on more than just metrics

Key tips and takeaways from a panel discussion on ESG reporting and engagement, advising how IR professionals can navigate new rules and evolving investor preferences