The largest asset manager in the world will be missing out on some revenue following Dutch pension fund PFZW’s shift in strategy.
PFZW revealed it would be pulling €29 billion ($34 billion) in mandates from BlackRock, as well as trillion-dollar asset manager LGIM, ESGToday reports.
-->While the pension fund is still in a BlackRock money market fund, a spokesperson confirms that “we did not renew our contract with BlackRock under our new investment strategy.”
PFZW is shifting toward focusing more on sustainability and active management.
According to ESGToday, BlackRock’s mandate was worth €14 billion ($16.41 billion) earlier this year, and LGIM’s at approximately €15 billion ($17.58 billion).
Says a spokesperson for the fund,
“PFZW has been developing a new investment strategy where financial performance, risk and sustainability are weighed equally within the framework of a total portfolio approach.
In collaboration with its pension fund manager PGGM, in the first half of 2024, the fund completed the selection process for managers who could take on the new listed equity and credit mandates under this Investment Policy 2030.”
Sander van Stijn, the head of mandate management at PGGM, the manager for the pension fund, says that the fund prefers to work with asset managers “who are not only financially strong but who also share our sustainability ambitions,” noting that the firm wants its partners “to be as closely aligned with us as possible.”
Van Stijn added that “not all asset managers – particularly in the United States – share the same perspective.”
Earlier this year, PME, another Dutch pension fund, said that US asset managers were “caving into pressures” from President Donald Trump’s administration by abandoning basic principles of responsible investing.
Said Daan Spaargaren, PME’s senior strategist for responsible investing,
“[US money managers] aren’t condemning what Trump is doing and how he is operating and how he is handling issues like climate change and demolishing the judiciary. We are worried about that.”
PME warned America’s investment industry that a Trump capitulation was causing it to think twice about its US investments.
