Tennessee is suing BlackRock over its environmental activism.
Yesterday, the state filed a lawsuit claiming the world’s largest asset manager broke consumer protection laws by making inconsistent statements about its investment strategies.
Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti explained that BlackRock is a member of environmental, social, and governance, or ESG, coalitions. Some of these groups require members to manage assets in support of specific environmental goals.
But BlackRock, which manages over $9 trillion of assets worldwide, does not always disclose these practices. Instead, the company tells clients it only considers return on investment when making investment decisions. Tennessee says consumers deserve to know which goal determines how BlackRock invests its money.
CEO Larry Fink claimed that BlackRock supports or ignores ESG initiatives based on what individual clients want.