Passive funds not so passive
Earlier this week, I read an article on who funds anti-climate research. I was surprised to find Vanguard there, a well known index tracker which comes up often for personal passive investing. Why would a passive fund fund anti-climate research? Well, because passive funds track indices, which include oil companies, some of the largest companies in the world, that why! Turns out The Guardian has a whole series on this.
Just now I was going through my oft neglected reading list and found I still had to read this article at Jacobinmag: it concerns the great power these huge funds have on stockholder meetings. Basically explains the above too: they control money, need to grow it, because of size have it in all kinds of industries and naturally have an interest in those industries performing well financially. Makes sense, I’d just never considered it.