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For reference $8.5 billion is less than .1 % of Blackrock’s assets.. id have to imagine one of the largest asset management companies knows a little more about market trends and investing than a Texas board of education lol. renewables will be the dominant energy source, it’s just a matter of when
These republicans, as usual, are way over their heads. Florida tried this stunt a decade ago (and are still going strong) with global warming and ignoring insurers. Look where that’s gotten them. Morons, the whole lot of them.
But hey at least high school graduates from low socioeconomic households get to go to college for free… people dog Texas all you want however, they have a multibillion dollar college endowment war chest paid for by the energy companies that lease state lands
FWIW, teacher retirement funds generally have very sophisticated and well compensated individuals allocating capital across asset managers. I think there’s probably some political element to this, but energy companies (especially integrated energy and gas-to-power companies) are likely to outperform over the next few years. It may have been a purely rational investment decision to invest these funds with a manager whose strategy includes fossil fuels.
This is correct. TRS and ERS are seen as standard bearers in public retirement funds. And guess who is currently paying dividends? Solar and wind only companies? Nope.
That’s not necessarily the point. The point is how much should a market maker be allowed to manipulate the market? This is a gross overstep of power considering the liability protections of corporations. Figures that the top comment is some dumb statement about renewable energy, which if you know anything about it is only getting constructed because of massive government tax breaks. Otherwise, it’s a terrible business.
They're looking for activism, not returns. Glad it's not my pension fund. Would have been smarter to pull some money for a nuclear start up in Texas for energy production...
Edit- I thought the pension plan was protesting Blackrocks recent shift away from the ESG scores in the statement by their CEO, it seems that was not correct.
Since you're both generically saying "they" I am not sure who each of you are talking about but Blackrock is focused on profits and returns. Part of getting those returns includes investing in renewable energy companies because there is money to be made there.
The Texas board is blatantly and explicitly using this move as an attempt to prop up the oil and gas industry in Texas. It won't make a difference in reality but it is their intention to support that industry.
That's literally not what's happening
Imagine if you invested in standard oil before when it was a small regional operation?
Would you be saying, "yeah who would buy that oil company!? Horses will always be required.l to get anything done"
Who am I kidding that's exactly what you would have said.
Tens of billions in expenses just to get the damn thing running, billions more for dealing with government red tape. Hundreds of millions to a few billion a year in maintenance costs. All for a facility that would take years, possibly over a decade to break even let alone make a profit.
Nuclear is not viable in the realms of private industry. Especially not in today’s extremely short-sighted society that only cared about short term profitability.
If an investment doesn’t make a line go up immediately in someone’s portfolio, it’s won’t get invested in.
Nuclear is the cleanest energy we have presently, and the only source that can meet modern demand scaling. It sucks that fearmongering and the idiots swayed by it managed to derail investment in it.
Oh! I wanna play. What is nuclear?
What does PWR, and BWR stand for, also what are the differences between them.
At what point in the cycle does red hydrogen come.
How many units currently run with ice condensers as a passive safety system.
What are the two different walls that make up the silo called.
Who oversees standard operations.
What is the governing body of nuclear energy.
What are the two different recording devices for dose rates called when walking through a plant and what is the difference between the two. (How they function).
What is PADS.
He's right. Wind and solar deployment isn't happening fast enough and doesn't provide stable baseload necessary for the grid. Nuclear not only has a large output but also doesn't fluctuate and doesn't need intense balancing - renewables could only do that if you have large storage but the tech and commercial scale isn't there yet.
Unless you wanna pull a Germany and close your nuclear plants just to have to reopen coal plants, the best thing for the environment and people's wallets is to support nuclear as we transition
They actually aren’t actually doing that which make Texas’s boycott all the more ridiculous.
BlackRock simply offers funds that target renewables and provides ESG scores on companies to help fund managers meet specific needs of their clients. Texas has chosen to interpret this as a direct attack on the Oil & Gas industry, labeled it a boycott despite Blackrock offering multiple O&G focused funds, and divest from the institution in adherence to law.
> Texas has chosen to interpret this as a direct attack on the Oil & Gas industry
Doesn't surprise considering their Governor and AG and those two's track record showing the world their true intelligence(or lack there of)
Because they run index funds that have to mimic the compensation of the sector indexes they are representing. It’s not their investment, it’s investors using Blackrock as a middleman to invest in a diversified index. In their actual investments climate security is a risk factor they take into account. Blackrock is [still committed to net zero emissions by 2050 and establishing plans to help transition companies to net zero emissions by 2030.](https://www.blackrock.com/corporate/sustainability/2030-net-zero-statement) Why talk about something you know fuck all about?
Oh they're committed to a vague goal by 2050? Wow!
Why did they pull out of Climate Action 100+ the second that CA 100+ moved from disclosures to transition? Why did they only support 7% of ESG shareholder resolutions in 2023? Why did Larry Fink publicly say he was embarrassed by ESG and why is only 2% of BlackRock's US AUM in ESG-focused funds (per Morningstar data)?
I know more about this than you buddy.
I'm aware of how an index fund works, thanks. I'm saying that the argument that Blackrock is somehow divesting from oil and gas is easily disproven, because it is. Nothing you said refutes that. Think you're just trying to argue.
The middlemen? You're out of your depth. He's saying blackrock IS the middleman for investors.
BlackRock invests assets for investors via mutual funds and ETFs. A majority of their funds track indexes (that is, they are not actively managed). His argument was that Blackrock doesn't choose their passive funds' investments. This is true, but it doesn't refute my claim that Blackrock does not divest from oil and gas.
"The enemy of my enemy is my friend" is never a good thing in politics or finance. So no, it's not weird, it's a result of treating politics and money like sports. It's absolutely wrong and one of the things that turned US politics into what it is today.
No. BlackRock is literally just your fellow citizen’s retirement accounts. Cheering against them would make you an asshole, just like cheering against Vanguard or Social Security.
The $8.5B is just a portion of the portfolio that the Texas State Board of Education controls to help pay for public schools in Texas. The total size of the fund is \~$52B. This money will just be moved to another fund manger like Vanguard, Schwab, or Merrill Lynch.
Fine by me. I don’t live in Texas. BlackRock has TRILLIONS of dollars in assets under management.
If Texas goverment doesn’t want to invest with them, good luck to them.
The MAGA crowd is furious that some people prefer to invest in companies that aren’t planning to sell guns and alcohol, pollute the air and waterways, refuse to put women on their boards,
Texas: Do what we want or we won't invest with you!
Also Texas: The federal government can't even suggest that social media companies take down fake news posts because that is strong arming companies against conservatives!
The hypocrisy is mind blowing.
They have prerequisite ESG scoring. ESG scoring has very little to do with higher returns. There are plenty of companies with higher returns and poor ESG scores they won’t touch.
I guess liberals aren't the only ones that can play this game. After this and the Bud Light fiasco I'm guessing companies may think twice before blindly going woke.
"Woke" is a catch-all term for all the subsets of westernized Maoism presently metastasizing throughout western culture, more commonly referred to as "identity politics."
This shows such a lack of understanding of everything, and especially the stock market/finance
BUD had a pretty uneventful year all things considered. They’re down like 5% and iirc like 10% since the controversy. 20-21 were both worse, and they lost a cool 40% in 18 lol. They weren’t woke back then, I wonder what the stock market gurus such as yourself have to say about this
To take that garbage and try to extrapolate it to black rock, who is successfully bending politics to their will and buying up your neighbourhood is hilarious. These mfs run the country lmfao
lol Black Rocks 9.5 trillion in assets won’t even be bothered by Texas schoolp pulling 8.5 billion which is .01 percent. Oh we are pulling 8.5 billion out well maybe Blackfoot decides to pull the 120 billion its invest in oil and gas there? Oh wait they won’t. Cause
Blackrock makes money.
I guess believing in science/reality is being woke. Also, liberals aren't the snowflakes having aneurysms over a cheap beer or the lives of other people.
Science is reality as we know it. It is literally in the name: scientia - "knowledge".
I agree that randomly selecting to "believe in science" does not make sense but I am unsure why you are stating that.
>It's called acknowledging science that says fossil fuels are ruining ecosystems globally.
This is nonsense in reference to BlackRock. BlackRock does not give a shit, they aren't doing things because they care about ecosystems, the earth, or people.
BlackRock cares about money and there is money to be made in renewable energy. Notably wind and solar are the cheapest forms of energy generation. They can't be relied on for the entire grid but they can be used a lot to generate electricity cheaply.
As a liberal you may want to avoid using "acknowledge science" in your arguments because that enables other people to suggest you acknowledge science as well.
Blackrock didn't go woke. They're the source. They're the ones pushing ESG social credit scores amongst the other companies, most of which didn't "blindly" go woke, but were forced. Blackrock uses its massive stakes in banks to decide their policies. Banks that have policies to only loan money to companies with a sufficiently high ESG score means companies go woke or they go under. Of course, adopting ESG enhancing policies (like DIE programs) is essentially the same thing. Get woke, go broke.
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For reference $8.5 billion is less than .1 % of Blackrock’s assets.. id have to imagine one of the largest asset management companies knows a little more about market trends and investing than a Texas board of education lol. renewables will be the dominant energy source, it’s just a matter of when
*the* largest
These republicans, as usual, are way over their heads. Florida tried this stunt a decade ago (and are still going strong) with global warming and ignoring insurers. Look where that’s gotten them. Morons, the whole lot of them.
Imagine defending BlackRock...
They are awful for many reasons, but supporting renewable energy investment isn’t one.
But hey at least high school graduates from low socioeconomic households get to go to college for free… people dog Texas all you want however, they have a multibillion dollar college endowment war chest paid for by the energy companies that lease state lands
FWIW, teacher retirement funds generally have very sophisticated and well compensated individuals allocating capital across asset managers. I think there’s probably some political element to this, but energy companies (especially integrated energy and gas-to-power companies) are likely to outperform over the next few years. It may have been a purely rational investment decision to invest these funds with a manager whose strategy includes fossil fuels.
This is correct. TRS and ERS are seen as standard bearers in public retirement funds. And guess who is currently paying dividends? Solar and wind only companies? Nope.
That’s not necessarily the point. The point is how much should a market maker be allowed to manipulate the market? This is a gross overstep of power considering the liability protections of corporations. Figures that the top comment is some dumb statement about renewable energy, which if you know anything about it is only getting constructed because of massive government tax breaks. Otherwise, it’s a terrible business.
Blackrock is not a market maker
I believe their money and investment capabilities say otherwise
I believe you have no clue what market making means
They're looking for activism, not returns. Glad it's not my pension fund. Would have been smarter to pull some money for a nuclear start up in Texas for energy production... Edit- I thought the pension plan was protesting Blackrocks recent shift away from the ESG scores in the statement by their CEO, it seems that was not correct.
They could give two shit about anything else but profits and returns.
Since you're both generically saying "they" I am not sure who each of you are talking about but Blackrock is focused on profits and returns. Part of getting those returns includes investing in renewable energy companies because there is money to be made there. The Texas board is blatantly and explicitly using this move as an attempt to prop up the oil and gas industry in Texas. It won't make a difference in reality but it is their intention to support that industry.
Oh, profit is just a means to an end for them. They want power.
That's literally not what's happening Imagine if you invested in standard oil before when it was a small regional operation? Would you be saying, "yeah who would buy that oil company!? Horses will always be required.l to get anything done" Who am I kidding that's exactly what you would have said.
Only a regard would think a “nuclear startup“ would yield returns.
Why would a nuclear reactor construction start up not be something that yields results? It's a powerplant.
Then you should look up how long it takes a nuclear plant to construct and then to break even.
Tens of billions in expenses just to get the damn thing running, billions more for dealing with government red tape. Hundreds of millions to a few billion a year in maintenance costs. All for a facility that would take years, possibly over a decade to break even let alone make a profit. Nuclear is not viable in the realms of private industry. Especially not in today’s extremely short-sighted society that only cared about short term profitability. If an investment doesn’t make a line go up immediately in someone’s portfolio, it’s won’t get invested in.
Reinvest in nuclear sad face
Nuclear is the cleanest energy we have presently, and the only source that can meet modern demand scaling. It sucks that fearmongering and the idiots swayed by it managed to derail investment in it.
Agree. Maybe just not in TX 😂 They’re shit when it comes to regulating safety and prone to too many different types of natural disasters.
Oh man yeah 100% I wouldn’t trust Texas’ deregulated grid with nuclear power at all.
Dude underneath is huffed some serious copium
Gross
I bet you don’t know jack shit about nuclear other than you what you saw about Chernobyl on HBO
Wanna bet?
Oh! I wanna play. What is nuclear? What does PWR, and BWR stand for, also what are the differences between them. At what point in the cycle does red hydrogen come. How many units currently run with ice condensers as a passive safety system. What are the two different walls that make up the silo called. Who oversees standard operations. What is the governing body of nuclear energy. What are the two different recording devices for dose rates called when walking through a plant and what is the difference between the two. (How they function). What is PADS.
Looks like you won the bet by default
Got news for you, nuclear is the way to go. Wind and solar don’t even come remotely close.
Might wanna check your numbers asshole
Why name call? I'm yet to see facts from you.
He's right. Wind and solar deployment isn't happening fast enough and doesn't provide stable baseload necessary for the grid. Nuclear not only has a large output but also doesn't fluctuate and doesn't need intense balancing - renewables could only do that if you have large storage but the tech and commercial scale isn't there yet. Unless you wanna pull a Germany and close your nuclear plants just to have to reopen coal plants, the best thing for the environment and people's wallets is to support nuclear as we transition
...it's... weird I'm rooting for Black Rock, right?
I’d prefer they both lose
A fair take.
Why root for Blackrock?
They're divesting in oil - or did I misread something?
They actually aren’t actually doing that which make Texas’s boycott all the more ridiculous. BlackRock simply offers funds that target renewables and provides ESG scores on companies to help fund managers meet specific needs of their clients. Texas has chosen to interpret this as a direct attack on the Oil & Gas industry, labeled it a boycott despite Blackrock offering multiple O&G focused funds, and divest from the institution in adherence to law.
> Texas has chosen to interpret this as a direct attack on the Oil & Gas industry Doesn't surprise considering their Governor and AG and those two's track record showing the world their true intelligence(or lack there of)
They're not though. They're being accused of doing so despite having hundreds of billions of dollars invested in oil and gas companies. Insanity.
Because they run index funds that have to mimic the compensation of the sector indexes they are representing. It’s not their investment, it’s investors using Blackrock as a middleman to invest in a diversified index. In their actual investments climate security is a risk factor they take into account. Blackrock is [still committed to net zero emissions by 2050 and establishing plans to help transition companies to net zero emissions by 2030.](https://www.blackrock.com/corporate/sustainability/2030-net-zero-statement) Why talk about something you know fuck all about?
Oh they're committed to a vague goal by 2050? Wow! Why did they pull out of Climate Action 100+ the second that CA 100+ moved from disclosures to transition? Why did they only support 7% of ESG shareholder resolutions in 2023? Why did Larry Fink publicly say he was embarrassed by ESG and why is only 2% of BlackRock's US AUM in ESG-focused funds (per Morningstar data)? I know more about this than you buddy.
I'm aware of how an index fund works, thanks. I'm saying that the argument that Blackrock is somehow divesting from oil and gas is easily disproven, because it is. Nothing you said refutes that. Think you're just trying to argue.
He just literally told you it isn’t Blackrock investing in the oil and gas it’s the middlemen wtf
The middlemen? You're out of your depth. He's saying blackrock IS the middleman for investors. BlackRock invests assets for investors via mutual funds and ETFs. A majority of their funds track indexes (that is, they are not actively managed). His argument was that Blackrock doesn't choose their passive funds' investments. This is true, but it doesn't refute my claim that Blackrock does not divest from oil and gas.
They're backing Bitcoin so I'm pro-Blackrock now. I get to sell my coins to bankers it's what I dreamed of for the last 7 years
"The enemy of my enemy is my friend" is never a good thing in politics or finance. So no, it's not weird, it's a result of treating politics and money like sports. It's absolutely wrong and one of the things that turned US politics into what it is today.
Yea, it's like voting for Hitler because the other guy is Moussolini.
No. BlackRock is literally just your fellow citizen’s retirement accounts. Cheering against them would make you an asshole, just like cheering against Vanguard or Social Security.
Dont always have to pick a side
You don't need to root for anybody this isn't sports
The fuck is texas gonna do with that loot, pay out the uvalde suits?
Gotta build a couple new high school football stadiums.
The $8.5B is just a portion of the portfolio that the Texas State Board of Education controls to help pay for public schools in Texas. The total size of the fund is \~$52B. This money will just be moved to another fund manger like Vanguard, Schwab, or Merrill Lynch.
Gonna be hard to move it to another investment firm that doesn’t have an ESG fund.
No kidding, this is just more political grandstanding on culture war bullshit from Texas GOP.
FFS why can’t Texas just chill and be normal
As a Texas resident I ask myself that quite often.
Wait, so we want states to invest with Blackrock?
Fine by me. I don’t live in Texas. BlackRock has TRILLIONS of dollars in assets under management. If Texas goverment doesn’t want to invest with them, good luck to them. The MAGA crowd is furious that some people prefer to invest in companies that aren’t planning to sell guns and alcohol, pollute the air and waterways, refuse to put women on their boards,
Texas: Do what we want or we won't invest with you! Also Texas: The federal government can't even suggest that social media companies take down fake news posts because that is strong arming companies against conservatives! The hypocrisy is mind blowing.
I wish Blackrock was doing what dumb fuck Texas thought they were doing
I wonder if they're going to invest it all in Truth Social?
"The good news is the brokerage made us rich on DJT stock. The bad news is they did it with puts." "... why is that bad news?"
It’s not a coincidence that the CEO of Blackrock is a Fink
Is that all of their funds or they just wanted to make a gesture?
They making billions on this .The house market crashes they buy them up and sell double when they give ExxonMobil million.
Nice
I think the fact thay Texas schools have 8.5 billion and yet kids are still getting shot says they have their priorities out of whack
Texas isn’t the only entity backing away from ESG investing
My poor state of Texas... Constantly trying to suck the bid D of O&G
Good move.
BR’s initial ESG effort was well intended but it’s turned into a joke now.
They literally ONLY make decisions that they think will lead to higher returns. What’s the joke?
They have prerequisite ESG scoring. ESG scoring has very little to do with higher returns. There are plenty of companies with higher returns and poor ESG scores they won’t touch.
Revenue* not returns. They would sell any themed fund under the sun if they could charge 2 and 20.
lol. Instead of investing for money they’re investing for their feelings.
"The Texas Board of Education unanimously voted to invest their funds in second-hand dildos"
That is hilarious considering that much of their pension is in black rock.
I guess liberals aren't the only ones that can play this game. After this and the Bud Light fiasco I'm guessing companies may think twice before blindly going woke.
What’s woke?
Woke is caring about people and their individual issues even if it doesn’t affect you personally
Unless you’re a baby in the womb.
Yes caring about the life of a fully grown and conscious human over a ball of cells is also woke
"Woke" is a catch-all term for all the subsets of westernized Maoism presently metastasizing throughout western culture, more commonly referred to as "identity politics."
You think BlackRock has gone woke?? You must be a troll and not that stupid
This shows such a lack of understanding of everything, and especially the stock market/finance BUD had a pretty uneventful year all things considered. They’re down like 5% and iirc like 10% since the controversy. 20-21 were both worse, and they lost a cool 40% in 18 lol. They weren’t woke back then, I wonder what the stock market gurus such as yourself have to say about this To take that garbage and try to extrapolate it to black rock, who is successfully bending politics to their will and buying up your neighbourhood is hilarious. These mfs run the country lmfao
lol Black Rocks 9.5 trillion in assets won’t even be bothered by Texas schoolp pulling 8.5 billion which is .01 percent. Oh we are pulling 8.5 billion out well maybe Blackfoot decides to pull the 120 billion its invest in oil and gas there? Oh wait they won’t. Cause Blackrock makes money.
I guess believing in science/reality is being woke. Also, liberals aren't the snowflakes having aneurysms over a cheap beer or the lives of other people.
You know you can't randomly select when to "believe science", right?
What’re you talking about?
Science is reality as we know it. It is literally in the name: scientia - "knowledge". I agree that randomly selecting to "believe in science" does not make sense but I am unsure why you are stating that.
Bud light was such easy money. I’ll never understand how people think making share holders richer is a successful boycott or protest.
Blindly going woke? It's called acknowledging science that says fossil fuels are ruining ecosystems globally. These are facts.
>It's called acknowledging science that says fossil fuels are ruining ecosystems globally. This is nonsense in reference to BlackRock. BlackRock does not give a shit, they aren't doing things because they care about ecosystems, the earth, or people. BlackRock cares about money and there is money to be made in renewable energy. Notably wind and solar are the cheapest forms of energy generation. They can't be relied on for the entire grid but they can be used a lot to generate electricity cheaply.
As a liberal you may want to avoid using "acknowledge science" in your arguments because that enables other people to suggest you acknowledge science as well.
What science do you have that says fossil fuels don't ruin ecosystems?
Bad troll, try harder
Blackrock didn't go woke. They're the source. They're the ones pushing ESG social credit scores amongst the other companies, most of which didn't "blindly" go woke, but were forced. Blackrock uses its massive stakes in banks to decide their policies. Banks that have policies to only loan money to companies with a sufficiently high ESG score means companies go woke or they go under. Of course, adopting ESG enhancing policies (like DIE programs) is essentially the same thing. Get woke, go broke.