Divest or Engage? Strategies for Responsible Investing

Vaska is a PhD student in Finance at Cambridge Judge Business School, University of Cambridge. She conducts research on responsible investing topics; currently focusing on negative portfolio screenings. Vaska holds a BSc in International Economics from the University of Essex and an MPhil in Finance from Cambridge Judge Business School. Prior to returning to full time education for her MPhil and PhD degrees, Vaska spent four years as an econometrics consultant in London. Her first paper examines the impact on firms when a large institutional investor publicly excludes them from its portfolio for (perceived) unethical behavior. Her second paper investigates the impact of sector screening for a well-diversified long-term investor. Her third paper surveys industry professionals on their sector exclusions views. Her work has been presented at the European Commission Conference on Promoting Sustainable Finance and the Inaugural Irish Academy of Finance Conference.

Jocelyn is a Senior Investment Manager in the Sustainable Ownership team at RPMI Railpen. Previously, she was an Executive Director at Institutional Shareholder Services and a policy advisor at the Financial Reporting Council. She studied at the University of Cambridge, Imperial College London and London Business School. She serves on the Corporate Governance Committee of the ICAEW and the Corporate Governance Advisory Council of the US Council of Institutional Investors.

David’s research interests span asset management and financial history; he has published in leading academic journals in finance and in economic history. He is the Academic Co-Director for the Centre for Endowment Asset Management at Cambridge Judge Business School. David sits on the editorial board of the Financial Analysts Journal. He is a member of a number of investment committees in both Cambridge and London and is a Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge. David received his PhD in 2008 from the London School of Economics. Prior to returning to full-time education in 2001, David worked for 20 years in investment banking in asset management, mergers and acquisitions and venture capital in Europe, Japan and the United States.

George has served as Policy Director at the International Corporate Governance Network since 2014, where he co-ordinates ICGN’s governance policies and committees, and plays an active role in ICGN’s policy development and regulatory outreach on behalf of members whose assets under management exceed $34 trillion. He is responsible for oversight of ICGN guidance statements, Viewpoint reports, public comment letters and broader thought leadership to promote ongoing governance reform and best practice by both companies and investors. George is also a Visiting Lecturer and a member of the Steering Committee of the Centre for Corporate Governance Research at Cass Business School, University of London, where he teaches MSc and executive education courses in corporate governance. Previously, George served as Director of Corporate Governance at F&C Investments (now BMO Global Asset Management) in London (£100 billion in assets under management), where he led F&C’s global policies relating to corporate governance, including proxy voting and engagement matters. George holds a BA degree, with distinction, from Stanford University and an MBA from the Haas School of the University of California at Berkeley.

Carole Ferguson heads up investor research at CDP an NGO which has been leading transparency from corporates on climate change through disclosure. CDP has 650 institutional members and signatories who represent large global institutional investors. Prior to joining CDP Carole has extensive experience in the financial sector working for Society Generale Asset Management as a fund manager for 10 years and for banks such as JP Morgan and Robert Fleming. Carole holds an MBA from London Business School and MSc in Economics and Policy of Energy and the Environment from UCL.

Julian’s research focuses on bankruptcy and financial distress, corporate ownership and control, cost of capital and regulation. He is an associate editor of five finance journals. He served as a member of the DTI-Treasury committee for reviewing the UK’s insolvency code in 2001 and was a member of one of the Company Law Review committees on corporate governance. He has been an advisor to Ofcom and its predecessor Oftel for more than 15 years. He also advises other UK regulatory authorities including the Office of Rail Regulation and the Office of Water Services (OFWAT). He was recently a member of the Breedon Committee, investigating new non-bank sources of finance for small to medium-sized companies. He has been a Visiting Professor at the University of California at both Berkeley and Los Angeles.

Aled joined FTSE Russell in November 2017 as Head of Sustainable Investment, Europe. Aled joined from Mercer’s Investment Consulting business where he was a Principal in the Global Responsible Investment team. At Mercer, Aled worked closely with large European asset owners and investment firms supporting them in all areas of RI strategy development and implementation, as well as ESG research and portfolio and manager analytics.

Prior to this, Aled managed the ESG integration activities of one of the UK’s largest public-sector pension schemes, the London Pensions Fund Authority. Aled’s RI industry experience spans more than 17 years during which time he has also worked in ESG analysis and research, as well as corporate voting and engagement for active portfolios on behalf of institutional and retail clients. Aled holds an MSc in Environmental Science from Lund University in Sweden and is a Member of the Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment.

Ola is the director of the Scandinavian Institute of maritime Law at the University of Oslo. He has been the chair of the Council on Ethics for the Norwegian Government Pension Fund Global and the chair of the Norwegian National Contact Point for the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. Currently, he chairs the Committee to review the Guidelines for Observation and Exclusion of Companies from the Government Pension Fund Global, which will submit its report in June 2020. He is also an ad hoc judge at the EFTA Court, Luxembourg. He has been in private practice and published extensively i.e. on oil and gas law, contract law, international law and constitutional law. During academic year 2016-17, he was a research fellow the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law, University of Cambridge. 

Richard Robinson is the Investment Director of Paul Hamlyn Foundation, a $1bn endowment fund in Kings Cross which was established by the publisher Paul Hamlyn in 1987. It helps young people, principally in the UK, achieve their potential and operates in the areas of arts, education and social justice. He is also chair of EFFIO, the Brussels based collective for thirty of the largest European not for profit foundations. He began his investment career in 1982 and has a masters degree from Oxford University.

Dr Michael Viehs joined Hermes in 2015, initially as part of Hermes EOS, and transferred to the Responsibility Office in 2018. He is responsible for the integration of ESG information across the investment strategies of all public market equity and credit funds. He also leads the firm’s ESG research activities, proving the value-add from incorporating ESG information into investment decisions. Michael is also responsible for corporate engagements at the executive and board level on ESG and strategic issues with German DAX corporations. Before his appointment at Hermes, Michael was Research Director at the University of Oxford’s Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment. His work on responsible investment, corporate governance, and stewardship has been published in Corporate Governance: An International Review and Annals of Social Responsibility. Michael holds a BSc, MSc and PhD from Maastricht University, School of Business and Economics.

Marco is a Professor of Finance and the Goldschmidt Professor of Corporate Governance at the Solvay Brussels School for Economics and Management at Université libre de Bruxelles where he teaches master courses on corporate governance, corporate restructuring and law, finance and economics. Becht is also a Founder Member, a Fellow and the Executive Director of the European Corporate Governance Institute, an international non-profit scientific association. In 2003 and 2012, he was Visiting Professor and Fellow at the Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, in 2008 Max Schmidheiny Visiting Professor for Entrepreneurship and Risk at the University of St. Gallen, in 2011 Visiting Professor at Stanford Law School and a Visiting Fellow at the Rock Center for Corporate Governance and in 2013 a Visiting Fellow at Columbia Law School.

Sarah is a co-founder of the Centre for Endowment Asset Management and she forms part of the management team leading the Centre’s development as a platform for research and education into long-horizon investing. Previously, Sarah set up and managed Cambridge Judge Business School’s post-experience Master of Finance degree, which has consistently been ranked by the Financial Times as one of the top two programmes globally. Prior to working in business education, Sarah worked in the international not-for-profit sector, including with Plan International and the United Nations Association, UK.

Vicente’s research interests span different areas in finance including; corporate finance, applied theory, applied econometrics, industrial organization and labour and personnel economics. He holds a PhD in Economics from the London School of Economics. He finished postdoctoral research (2012) at Stanford University. Vicente participated in the 2104 AXA Research Program on Risk Management and Regulation of Financial Institutions, and in 2005 he contributed to Ministerio de Educación DGES Instituciones y Activos Financieros en Información Asimétrica.

Elroy chairs the Centre for Endowment Asset Management at Cambridge Judge Business School. His research focuses on long-horizon investing, active ownership and case studies on investing, and his publications are on investment management, endowment strategy, responsible investing and financial market history. Elroy chairs the Advisory and Policy Boards of FTSE Russell, and serves on the Supervisory Council of the Geneva Finance Research Institute; until 2016 he chaired the Strategy Council of the Norwegian Government Pension Fund Global. Elroy is a Fellow or Honorary Fellow of CFA UK, the Institute of Actuaries, the Royal Historical Society, the Risk Institute at Ohio State University, and Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He is also Emeritus Professor of Finance at London Business School where he did his PhD.

Jane is the Head of Responsible Investment at Border to Coast and is working towards implementing the Responsible Investment Strategy across internally and externally managed assets. Prior to joining Border to Coast, Jane worked as a portfolio manager for the South Yorkshire Pension Fund; an internally managed fund prior to pooling. During her time at South Yorkshire Jane managed European and UK equity portfolios. Additionally, she also oversaw the Fund’s voting activities, was responsible for developing responsible investment policy and stewardship practice and engaged with companies and stakeholders on ESG issues. Jane sat on the Local Authority Pension Fund Forum Executive for five years. She has a first-class degree in International Studies from the Open University. 

Rajna is a Professor of Finance at the University of Geneva. She has been a Board Member at Swiss Re since 2000 and she is a former Member of the Swiss Federal Banking Commission (1997-2004). Her research interests are in experimental finance, asset pricing, alternative investments and corporate governance. She currently teaches the courses “Advanced Asset Pricing” and “Hedge Funds” in the Master in Wealth Management. She was Managing Director of the Geneva Finance Research Institute between 2009-17, and she was Head of Research at the Swiss Finance Institute between 2007-14 and a Director of the National Centre of Competence in Research FINRISK between 2001-09. Rajna holds a PhD in Economic and Social Sciences (Specialization in Finance) from the University of Geneva. 

Oğuzhan’s research focuses on corporate governance, ownership and control, private equity, dynamic investment strategies, and corporate social responsibility. His research has been published in the highest ranked financial journals and his paper titled Active Ownership (with Elroy Dimson and Xi Li) is the recipient of prestigious awards, including the 2016 FIR-PRI Finance and Sustainability European Research Award. Prior to joining Cambridge Judge Business School, Oğuzhan was an Assistant Professor of Finance at the Carroll School of Management at Boston College. He has served as a part-time consultant to a hedge fund on establishing trading strategies. His PhD is from London Business School.

Bang’s research interests are corporate finance; empirical finance; corporate governance. He is a visiting scholar at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, US since 2015. Before joining Cambridge Judge Business School in September 2010, Bang was an assistant professor of finance at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He graduated from HEC Paris in July 2006 with a PhD degree in finance. From January 2003 to April 2004, Bang was a visiting scholar in the Finance Department at Stern School of Business, New York University.

Lesley was appointed as a trustee of the Medical Research Foundation in August 2018. Lesley is a Director of Temple Bar Investment Trust and lectures in global business ethics at King’s College, London. She has 25 years’ investment experience running global portfolios with an especial emphasis on the financial sector. At King’s College, she lectures on the Masters course in Global Ethics and Human Values on issues involving citizenship, corporate citizenship and global business ethics. She published Can Microfinance Work? in 2016 and her current research interests include financial inclusion and responsible investment.

Lesley was previously a Director of Save & Prosper Group, Fleming Flagship, Fleming Investment Management (where she ran the global portfolios team), US Smaller Companies Investment Trust and Ark Asset Management, a hedge fund company that she founded in 1999. Her BA was in Politics, Philosophy and Economics from New College, Oxford, and she holds an MA and PhD from King’s College, London.