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Analyzing Active Fund Managers' Commitment to ESG: Evidence from the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment

MANAGEMENT SCIENCE2023-02

Kim, Soohun | Yoon, Aaron

The United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) is the largest global environmental, social, and governance (ESG) initiative in the asset-management industry to date. We analyze what happens after active U.S. mutual funds sign the PRI to assess whether they exhibit ESG implementation. We find that PRI signatories attract a large fund inflow, but we do not observe improvements in fund-level ESG scores or fund returns. We consider a battery of ways to proxy for funds??? ESG incorporation (e.g., entry/ exit, screening, engagement, voting for pro-ESG proposals), but fail to observe evidence of meaningful on average follow-through. Next, we explore cross-sectional fund characteristics and find that only quant funds exhibit small improvements in ESG performance versus other funds, mainly through buying high-ESG-performing stocks. Furthermore, we note that signatories are not superior performers in ESG issues prior to joining the PRI relative to non-PRI funds, but PRI affiliation tends to be widely advertised on company websites, marketing materials, and fund documents. Overall, a reasonable reader may perceive our findings as consistent with PRI funds??? greenwashing. We note, however, that what we uncover is based only on outcome-based measures and may miss some actual efforts of signatories.

Publisher
INFORMS
Issue Date
2023-02
Article Type
Article
Citation
MANAGEMENT SCIENCE, Vol.69, No.2, pp.741 - 758
ISSN
0025-1909
DOI
10.1287/mnsc.2022.4394
Contact : Joo, Sunhee ( shjoo2006@kaist.ac.kr )

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