BlackRock and Thomson Reuters have launched the new iShares Thomson Reuters Inclusion & Diversity UCITS ETF (OPEN). While other environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ETFs exist, they tend to focus on one aspect of diversity and inclusion, like race or gender. OPEN aims to capture a broad set of ESG issues, with 24 metrics across diversity, inclusion, news/controversies, and people development categories.
The fund is expected to meet documented demand, as Cerulli Associates found that 45% of all households now prefer ESG investing.
“Within our corporate culture, we do see the benefits of building and flourishing an inclusive organization,” said Elena Philipova, global head of diversity at Thomson Reuters. “It’s becoming vastly accepted that it’s not coming at the expense of profitability […] It’s a prerequisite of profitability.”
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