Tag: Larry Fink

Indiana Issues Cease and Desist Order Against BlackRock, Alleging Misleading ESG Statements

Just the News
Diego Morales

Indiana’s state securities regulator issued a cease and desist order against BlackRock Thursday, accusing the investment giant of fraudulent actions related to its ESG products and offerings. The company denies the allegations.

According to the Indiana Securities Division, BlackRock has repeatedly made false and misleading statements to Indiana investors with regards to the company’s ESG products. Indiana accuses BlackRock of pushing ESG factors on portfolio companies and informing clients they would see better long-term returns on their investments through ESG-backed funds. Though, according to the order, there was little to no evidence to substantiate the claim.

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Woke 2.0: ESG Critics Say the Same Movement Marches on, Only with a New Name

Just the News

BlackRock began renaming environmental, social and governance (ESG) earlier this year. It’s now calling it “transition investing.”

The company recently updated its climate and decarbonization stewardship guidelines. The document makes no mention of ESG, but it shows in many ways, the world’s largest investment manager with $10 trillion in assets under management is still pursuing many of the same goals.

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BlackRock to Make Massive Infrastructure Move to ‘Decarbonize the World’ and Reap Government Subsidies

Admin

BlackRock on Friday reached an agreement to acquire Global Infrastructure Partners for $12.5 billion, a move aimed at advancing the investment giant’s climate objectives and capitalizing on government subsidies, according to statements and reports.

BlackRock is the world’s largest asset manager and is a proponent of environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) investing. Both companies share a commitment to decarbonization and BlackRock sees the deal’s timing as opportune, as governments have offered businesses rare financial incentives to build infrastructure, including for green energy projects, according to a press release.

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Unmasking Academic Injustice: Dr. Carol Swain Reveals Deeper Impact on Scholarly Integrity amid Plagiarism Scandal at Harvard

Tennessee Star Staff
Carol Swain Harvard

Esteemed former Vanderbilt professor, renowned scholar, and all-star panelist Dr. Carol Swain joined The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Tuesday to discuss the growing scandal involving Harvard’s Claudine Gay and increasingly difficult-to-defend allegations of plagiarism by the Ivy League school’s president.

Swain contends that Gay failed to credit her for sections of the book Black Faces, Black Interests, accusing her of derivative work since her dissertation, which Swain claims builds upon her own groundbreaking research.

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Tennessee A.G. Jonathan Skrmetti on His First-in-the-Nation Lawsuit Against BlackRock for Alleged Consumer Protection Violations

Tennessee Star Staff
TN AG Courtroom

Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti appeared in-studio on Tuesday’s edition of The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy, to discuss the first-of-its-kind lawsuit his office filed Monday against financial services giant BlackRock over alleged violations of consumer protection laws.

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Tennessee A.G. Skrmetti Puts BlackRock on Notice About ESG: ‘It’s Not for Big Financial Companies to Decide What Policies Everybody in a Given Industry Should Follow’

Tennessee Star Staff
AG Skrmetti

Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti appeared in-studio on Tuesday’s edition of The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy, where he laid out the reasons why BlackRock’s alleged double standards that they are pushing Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) initiatives that effectively force companies to shift their priorities are not just afoul consumer protection laws.

If left unchecked, Skrmetti argues, the opaque and unaccountable nature of corporate policymaking threatens the foundational principles of self-governance.

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Nikki Haley Meets with BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, Other Wall Street Elites

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Nikki Haley

Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley met with several Wall Street executives in a series of events Tuesday in her bid to be the Republican nominee for president, according to the Financial Times.

Haley attended a small meet-and-greet breakfast in New York where CEO of BlackRock Larry Fink was in attendance, followed by a fundraiser later in the day co-hosted by Gary Cohn, former president of Goldman Sachs, according to the FT. BlackRock has been criticized by conservatives in recent years for its adoption and promotion of Environment, Social and Corporate Governance (ESG) policies, which aim to invest in companies based on their commitment to social and environmental causes.

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Commentary: Rumors of ESG’s Demise Are Greatly Exaggerated

Admin

Consumer and Republican backlash against Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) investments has increased dramatically in the past year as states, Congress and presidential candidates have taken on the issue, promising to rein in the largely green-conscious movement of capital amid spiraling energy and food costs since 2021.

Boycotts of brands such as Bud Light, Disney and Target, coupled with statements by Blackrock CEO Larry Fink that he no longer wanted to call these so-called sustainable investments ESG— at Aspen Ideas Festival on June 25 Fink said “I’m not going to use the word ESG because it’s been misused by the far left and the far right… we talk a lot about decarbonization, we talk a lot about governance … or social issues, if that’s something we need to address…”—and reported outflows from ESG funds in 2023 have painted a gloomy picture for green and socially conscious investing.

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Commentary: BlackRock and Its ESG ‘Voting Choice’ Ruse

RealClearWire

Amid growing criticism of its environmental, social and governance (ESG) investment  practices, BlackRock has announced that it will offer retail investors in its largest exchange-traded fund (ETF) the opportunity to participate in its “Voting Choice” program. Open to institutional clients since January 2022, this program allows investors to choose from a limited set of options to guide BlackRock in voting their shares. While perhaps an effective PR tool, Voting Choice is little more than a ruse that neither empowers investors nor diminishes BlackRock’s power to impose its ESG goals on American businesses. 

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Commentary: Does Anyone Buy That the Head of BlackRock Is ‘Ashamed’ of ESG?

Admin

The big news in energy this week is that BlackRock CEO Larry Fink says he is no longer using the term “ESG” in his business communications. Even more, Mr. Fink is now “ashamed” to be a participant in the debate on the issue. At least, that’s what he initially said on Sunday to an audience at the Aspen Ideas Festival, where he was a speaker.

“I’m ashamed of being part of this conversation,” Fink said as quoted by Axios. But almost as soon as he made the admission, Fink took it all back when pressed by his session’s moderator. “I never said I was ashamed,” he said, even though he had just actually said that very thing. “I’m not ashamed. I do believe in conscientious capitalism.”

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Commentary: BlackRock’s Larry Fink and the New Post-ESG Realism

RealClearWire

As regular as the turn of the seasons, each January sees Larry Fink, founder and CEO of BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, publish a lengthy letter on the state of the world and its implications for finance and investors. This year, January turned to February, and still no letter. Instead, February saw Tim Buckley, CEO of Vanguard, global number-two asset manager, give a groundbreaking interview explaining Vanguard’s decision late last year to quit the Net Zero Asset Managers (NZAM) initiative, which had been formed ahead of the 2021 Glasgow climate conference to reallocate capital in line with net zero emissions targets.

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Woke ESG Management Fund BlackRock Owns 6 Percent of Norfolk Southern, Whose Train Derailed in Ohio

Michael Patrick Leahy

Black Rock owns more than 6 percent of Norfolk Southern Railway, the huge railway company whose train derailed in East Palestine, Ohio on February 3, causing what many are describing as an ecological and health disaster for residents of Ohio and nearby Pennsylvania.

Fintel.io reports that as of February 16, 2023, Black Rock owns 6.8 percent of Norfolk Southern Railway.

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Arizona Treasurer Kimberly Yee Explains Divestment from BlackRock Following CEO Fink’s Political Messaging

Neil Jones

Arizona State Treasurer Kimberly Yee (R) shared in a statement Thursday how her office has made significant divestments from investment company BlackRock following concerns that CEO Larry Fink was using the company to spread his political beliefs.

“The Arizona Treasury has received many questions, comments and concerns in the past few months regarding BlackRock, as several states have recently announced they are no longer investing with BlackRock,” said Yee. “We will continue to fight back against the dangerous path of companies pushing their social issues and wokeism inside of the investment space and return to traditional money management that puts the people first.”

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Republican Treasurers Pull $1 Billion from BlackRock over Alleged Anti-Fossil Fuel Policies

Admin
exterior of BlackRock

Republican state treasurers are withdrawing $1 billion in assets from BlackRock’s control due to the asset manager’s alleged boycott of the fossil fuel industry, according to the Financial Times.

Republican South Carolina State Treasurer Curtis Loftus is pulling $200 million from BlackRock by the end of 2022, and Louisiana treasurer John Schroder said on Oct. 5 that he is divesting $794 million from the company, according to the FT. Utah treasurer Marlo Oaks said he removed $100 million in funds from BlackRock’s control, and Arkansas treasurer Dennis Milligan pulled $125 million from the company in March.

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BlackRock CEO Hails High Energy Prices for ‘Accelerating’ Green Transition

Admin

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said during a forum at the Clinton Global Initiative that increased energy prices are “accelerating” the transition to “green” energy.

“Because of the rising energy prices, we are certainly seeing the green premium shrink quite considerably. And so, the amount of investment dollars that are going into new decarbonization technology is accelerating, and accelerating very rapidly,” Fink told former President Bill Clinton.

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States Preemptively Banning ESG Practices Pushed by Big Capital

Peter D'Abrosca

States across the country are preemptively banning Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) scoring, which some say would lead to a massive consolidation of wealth among the most powerful investment companies in America. 

“In an attempt to secure vast amounts of wealth and influence over society, corporations, bankers, and investors, working closely with key government officials, have launched a unified effort to impose environmental, social, and governance (ESG) standards on most of the industrialized global economy. (ESG standards are also referred to as ‘sustainable investment’ or ‘stakeholder capitalism.’),” Justin Haskins at The Heartland Institute said. 

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Big Capital’s Social Justice ESG Bills Soar Through State Legislatures

Peter D'Abrosca
exterior of BlackRock

Just months after The Star News Network reported on Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) scores taking over corporate America, bills are pouring into state legislatures around the country, some with the intent on implementing the practice and others with the intent of banning the practice. 

Justin Haskins at The Heartland Institute, which has closely tracked ESG scores, defines them as the following:

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Commentary: BlackRock CEO Larry Fink Warns Environmental, Social and Governance Investors Ukraine War Will ‘Slow the World’s Progress Toward Net Zero’ in Near Term

Admin
Larry Fink

Blackrock CEO Larry Fink warned Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) investors in his $10 trillion hedge fund’s annual shareholder letter that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — and the resulting Western sanctions on Russia — had disrupted globalization and interdependent supply chains and would result in “increasing oil and gas supply” in the U.S. and “coal consumption may increase over the next year” in Europe and Asia to offset the drop in Russian exports.

As a result, Fink projected, “This will inevitably slow the world’s progress toward net zero in the near term,” referring to ESG goals like net zero global carbon emissions by 2050 that would encounter challenges, particularly as American consumers pay much higher prices with consumer inflation up 7.9 percent and producer inflation up 10 percent the past twelve months.

Those price pressures will mean more oil and gas production immediately, Fink said.

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Schweizer: The Titans of Wall Street Are Among China’s Closest American Allies

Julie Carr

TRANSCRIPT: McCabe: One of the great ironies in investigative journalist Peter Schweizer’s new book Red-Handed is the degree to which the Chinese Communist Party has infiltrated the very heart of American capitalism on Wall Street. Schweizer told The Star News Network that the titans of Wall Street are among China’s closest allies. Schweizer: What China wants from Wall Street is access to Western capital with no questions asked. And unfortunately, the biggest firms on Wall Street are prepared to give it to them. So when the Trump administration pushed for tariffs and restrictions on Chinese economic activity in the United States, one of the first institutions to stand up and protest in the White House were the big firms on Wall Street. McCabe: Schweizer said one of the Chinese Communist Party’s biggest supporters on Wall Street is BlackRock and its CEO and co-founder Larry Fink. Schweizer: He basically runs a fund that that manages money that’s equivalent to half of the entire United States economy. So he has an enormous pull. McCabe: The investigative reporter said Fink is not shy about his support for the Chinese government. Schweizer: He has also praised the regime. He said that yes, you know,…

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Commentary: BlackRock CEO Larry Fink’s Woke Capitalism Crusade Runs into Resistance

RealClearWire

Only a few years after “woke capitalism” was touted as the wave of the future, its supporters are getting a wakeup call of their own.

Just ask BlackRock CEO Larry Fink. The tone of his 2022 letter to CEOs is very different from his previous two, both of which pushed Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) investment criteria and “stakeholder capitalism” relentlessly. As far as Fink was concerned, ESG, “sustainability,” and the agenda for what we have termed “woke capital” would dominate the markets for years, while he and his $10 trillion asset management behemoth would, in turn, dominate them. Fink was to be king of the stakeholder world.

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Schweizer: BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, Other Wall Street Leaders Partner with Chinese Coal, Military Enterprises

Neil W. McCabe

The investigative journalist and author of Red-Handed: How American Elites Get Rich Helping China Win told The Star News Network the titans of capitalism on Wall Street are now the partners of the Chinese Communist Party.

“What China wants from Wall Street is access to Western capital with no questions asked, and unfortunately the biggest fans on Wall Street are prepared to give it to them,” said Peter Schweizer, who is the president and founder of the Government Accountability Institute and the host of The Drill Down podcast.

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Commentary: Woke Capital Won’t Save the Planet – but It Will Crash the Economy

RealClearWire

Judged by BlackRock CEO Larry Fink’s latest letter, January 2022 might turn out to be the highwater mark of woke capitalism. Stakeholder capitalism is not “woke,” Fink says, because capitalism is driven by mutually beneficial relationships between businesses and their stakeholders. He’s right. What Fink describes is capitalism pure and simple, the stakeholder modifier adding nothing to the uniqueness of capitalism in harnessing competition and innovation for the benefit of all.

Fink’s shift is more than rhetorical. Just three years ago, in his 2019 “Profit and Purpose” letter, Fink told CEOs that the $24 trillion of wealth Millennials expect to inherit from their Boomer parents meant that ESG (environment, social, governance) issues “will be increasingly material to corporate valuations.” Now Fink tells them that “long-term profitability” is the measure by which markets will determine their companies’ success, dumping the ESG valuation metrics he’d previously championed.

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Ohio Native Vivek Ramaswamy Blasts BlackRock CEO Larry Fink

Peter D'Abrosca

The founder and Executive Chairman of the biopharmaceutical company Roivant Sciences blasted BlackRock Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Larry Fink.

“Larry Fink claims to embrace ‘ESG.’ In practice, he does political favors for the CCP in return for market access to China and earns hefty fees from American workers who have no idea how he uses their assets to advance his own agenda. The face of the woke-industrial complex,” Vivek Ramaswamy said on Twitter.

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