Corbett shows how public outrage at the unelected political power of asset managers has led to an investor backlash, with politicians and legislators taking steps against the “forcing of behaviors” which BlackRock CEO Larry Fink once trumpeted as his mission
The always engaging James Corbett has produced some of the most informative guides to the power of BlackRock – who together with second-placed Vanguard Group own a combined 15 trillion U.S. dollars of assets under management.
In this report I relate how Corbett argues for a fightback against BlackRock and the asset management giants like them, who use their power to shape the world regardless of public consent. His views are more than corroborated by the news which followed the release of his video.
Corbett’s September 21 presentation, “How to Defeat BlackRock,” followed up by his excellent, “How BlackRock Conquered the World,” begins with some very encouraging news about the fortunes of the global investment giants – and what can be done to stop them. Happily, this process is already underway.
Corbett shows how public outrage at the unelected political power of asset managers has led to an investor backlash, with politicians and legislators taking steps against the “forcing of behaviors” which BlackRock CEO Larry Fink once trumpeted as his mission.
According to Corbett, and a growing number of other sources, this pressure looks likely to force asset management giants like BlackRock out of the behavior business altogether.
The first piece of good news is that the brand of ESG (environmental, social and governance) is so toxic that not even BlackRock’s CEO wants to use it any more.
BlackRock, under the leadership of Larry Fink, has used its immense wealth for years to compel companies to adopt the ESG agenda, becoming the driving force of “woke” capitalism. Yet leveraging financial power to force social and political change in this way has led to a backlash – from the general public, from lawmakers – and from the financial sector itself.
Last December, the North Carolina State Treasurer Dale R. Folwell called for Fink’s resignation, threatening to withdraw over $14 billion in state funds from the investment firm. As The Daily Mailreported, Folwell said:
Fink is in ‘pursuit of a political agenda… A focus on ESG is not a focus on returns and potentially could force us to violate our own fiduciary duty.’
Six months later, in June 2023, Fink said he was “ashamed” of ESG which he said had become “politically weaponized.”
Though his company, BlackRock, has continued to rate businesses on the same criteria, it has removed almost every mention of the term from its communications.
Speaking in Aspen, Colorado, Fink admitted that the decision of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to withdraw $2 billion in state assets managed by BlackRock had hurt the company. The ESG agenda advanced by BlackRock is so beleaguered, even its former champion will not speak its name.
The power of public opinion
What this shows, as Corbett argues, is a further piece of good news: that public opinion still matters. It is public knowledge of the unelected political meddling of BlackRock and others which has led to outrage – and to action.
As a result of extensive coverage – mainly from independent media – of the nefarious influence of his company, Larry Fink has faced sustained criticism for over a year. This in turn has led to the kind of legal and financial consequences which have made people like Fink think again.
This also shows why so much money is invested in propaganda, censorship and “narrative control.” Governments and corporations are afraid of a well-informed public, because such a public is very likely to demand they are held to account.
The case of BlackRock not only shows that what is in your mind can indeed matter, but also that the goliaths of globalism do not always win.
This is one reason for the ongoing information war, and the growing censorship-industrial complex. An informed citizenry has the power to hold the powerful to account. Taken together, public outrage can also move markets – and the money men who watch them.
I investigated some of the claims Corbett made about the financial world’s mounting unease with the involvement of BlackRock, Vanguard and other firms in pushing unelected political and social change. I found more cause for celebration than even Corbett himself would admit at the time.
Passive investments, legal actions
In further good news, mounting legal troubles have accompanied the practice of companies like BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street to leverage their enormous asset piles into social and political compliance engineering.
According to a June 2023 report from RIAbiz, an online journal for registered investment advisers (RIAs), BlackRock and Vanguard’s “fooling around” with ESG targets has left them exposed to prosecution.
The business of managing many assets is supposed to be “passive” – a legal term which means that companies such as BlackRock are prohibited from “exercising control” of the companies whose funds they manage.
Federal exemptions had been granted to these asset management giants, but their habit of forcing behaviors on issues such as carbon “net zero” and “diversity” has placed their capacity to do business in jeopardy.
In May of this year, BlackRock and Vanguard saw a legal challenge emerge, and one which not only deters investors, but may also lead to their being broken up.
Seventeen AGs moved on May 10 against BlackRock on the grounds that its climate-based activism and its pro-ethical, governance and social (ESG) stance make it an active investor, in breach of a FERC antitrust agreement.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is involved due to BlackRock’s – and Vanguard’s – holdings in domestic energy utilities. Breen continues:
Separately, 13 AGs filed a motion to block Vanguard from renewing its FERC exemption. They represent mostly energy-producing states like Texas, as do the 17 now pressing to have BlackRock’s exemption revoked.
Though Breen concluded that both firms had “won a reprieve” from immediate legal censure, the message appears to have been received.
Finance giants BlackRock and Vanguard – once ESG’s biggest proponents – seem to be reversing course.
Hitting the bottom line
The global business publication noted the legal complications of mixing finance with social, environmental and governance policies, saying:
It appears these strategic shifts are being driven by a combination of public backlash and a focus on their bottom lines.
Then, on October 23, leading U.S. insurance brokerage WTW reported that BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street had all seen significant drops in their total amounts of assets under management (AUM). BlackRock’s alone fell from over 10 trillion dollars to just over 8 trillion.
By October 31, Fortune returned with the verdict that BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street had all “turned against environment and social proposals… in a clear sign of backlash.”
Their report noted a “precipitous” fall in the support of all three asset giants’ commitment to these agendas – with BlackRock’s funding of “ESG” measures falling by over 30 percent from 2021.
Real world consequences
This is the delayed result of a reality which BlackRock themselves acknowledged – and one which drove much of the public disapproval – that the ESG agenda was an economic and social wrecking ball.
Remarkably, BlackRock itself admitted that its promotion of ESG, in the aggressive pursuit of net zero and diversity policies, had actually contributed to a severe economic downturn.
In its “2023 Outlook,” the asset giant said these initiatives had been a major factor in ending the decades-long period of prosperity in the West known as the Great Moderation.
In his video Corbett is frank about the limitations of individual consumer power. You cannot “access BlackRock directly,” as it is a management firm. You can, of course, withdraw support from the companies in which it and its fellow behemoths Vanguard and State Street have holdings.
Yet Corbett moves from boycotts of individual corporations to the intriguing concept of “buycotts.” What he means by this is “taking your money from the corporations and using it to build things you want to see.”
How realistic is this solution? Already, businesses are emerging to capitalize on growing public discontent with what is done with their money – without their consent or approval.
Changing our behaviors – for good
The investment platform Reverberate, for example, allows users to“Rate companies highly (over 2.5 stars) if they make your life better, or lower if they make your life worse.”
What is more, user feedback from the public will determine which shares it buys:
Our publicly-traded investment fund buys shares of companies whose average ratings are high and/or rising, and sells shares of those whose average ratings are low and/or falling.
This is our way of trying to align capital allocation with the interests of the general public, as estimated by us in a relatively unbiased, wide-reaching way.
The decline of the asset managers’ ESG agenda is a happy corrective to the damaging belief that nothing can be done about anything.
It shows how well-informed public opinion can lead to genuine change, and with some of Corbett’s insights, how we can move from complaint to constructive action in making a better world.
You can see Corbett’s entertaining case for countering the woke asset management giants here.
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As noted by the Trudeau government, plastic substitutes contribute to lower air quality and “typically have higher climate change impacts” due to higher GHG emissions.
Recently at the White House, President Donald Trump signed an executive order reversing the Biden administration’s plan to phase out plastic straws. The Trudeau government, however, continues with its plan to ban single-use plastics, even though this prohibition will have minimal impact worldwide, will actually increase waste in Canada, and force a transition to alternatives that impose greater environmental harm. Rather than doubling down on a flawed policy, the next federal government should reverse Trudeau’s plastic ban.
In 2021, the Trudeau government classified plastic items as “toxic,” paving the way for the ban on the manufacturing, importing and selling of checkout bags, cutlery, stir sticks and straws—all single-use plastics. In 2023, the Federal Court deemed the designation “unreasonable and unconstitutional”—but the Trudeau government defended the measure and is appealing, with a ruling expected this year.
According to the latest available data, Canada’s contributes 0.04 per cent to global plastic waste. The United States contributes 0.43 per cent—more than 10 times Canada’s share. But neither country is a major contributor to global plastic waste.
According to a 2024 article published in Nature, a leading scientific journal, no western country ranks among the top 90 global plastic polluters, thanks to their near-total waste collection and controlled disposal systems. Conversely, eight countries—India, Nigeria, Indonesia, China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Russia and Brazil—generate more than half of global plastic waste. And nearly 75 per cent of the world’s ocean plastic comes from Asia with only six countries (Philippines, India, Malaysia, China, Indonesia and Myanmar) accounting for most of the world’s ocean plastic pollution.
The Trudeau government’s own science assessment, cited in the court appeal, states that 99 per cent of Canada’s plastic waste is already disposed of safely through recycling, incinerating and environmentally-friendly landfills. Despite these facts, plastic has become a target for blanket restrictions without fully considering its benefits or the downsides of switching to alternatives.
Consider this. Plastics are lightweight, durable and indispensable to modern life. From medical devices, food packaging, construction materials, textiles, electronics and agricultural equipment, plastics play a critical role in sectors that improve living standards.
Alternatives to plastic come with their own environmental cost. Again, according to the government’s own analysis, banning single-use plastics will actually increase waste generation rather than reduce it. While the government expects to remove 1.5 million tonnes of plastics by 2032 with the prohibition, it will generate nearly twice as much that weight in waste from alternatives such as paper, wood and aluminum over the same period. Put simply, the ban will result in more, not less, waste in Canada.
And there’s more. Studies suggest that plastic substitutes such as paper are heavier, require more water and energy to be produced, demand more energy to transport, contribute to greater smog formation, present more ozone depletion potential and result in higher greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
As noted by the Trudeau government, plastic substitutes contribute to lower air quality and “typically have higher climate change impacts” due to higher GHG emissions.
While plastic pollution is a pressing global environmental issue, Canada is not a major contributor to this problem. The rationale behind the Trudeau government’s plastic ban lacks foundation, and as major economies including the U.S. go back to plastic, Canada’s plastic prohibition becomes increasingly futile. The next federal government, whoever that may be, should reverse this plastic ban, which will do more harm than good.
Julio Mejía
Policy Analyst
Elmira Aliakbari
Director, Natural Resource Studies, Fraser Institute
Stocks sunk Thursday afternoon despite President Donald Trump’s decision to grant major exceptions to the 25% tariffs he put on Mexico and Canada earlier this week.
All three major U.S. market indexes were in the red by the time of Trump’s afternoon bill signing. Trump said Thursday in the Oval Office that steel and aluminum tariffs were on track for next week without modifications.
Trump shrugged off the stock losses, blaming the decline on “globalists.”
“I think it’s globalists that see how rich our country is going to be and don’t like it,” he said.
Trump has promised that his tariffs would shift the tax burden away from Americans and onto foreign countries, but tariffs are generally paid by the people who import the products. Those importers then have a choice: They can either absorb the loss or pass it on to consumers through higher prices. He also promised tariffs would make America “rich as hell.” And he’s used tariffs as a negotiating tactic to tighten border security.
Trump granted temporary tariff relief to both Canada and Mexico on Thursday by exempting goods under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement from tariffs until April 2.
On April 2, Trump plans to announce broader reciprocal tariffs against countries that impose tariffs on U.S. goods or keep U.S. goods out of their markets through other methods.
Since imposing his latest round of tariffs on top of trading partners this week, Trump has been paring them back. On Wednesday, Trump said the Big Three automakers – Ford Motor Co., General Motors Co. and Stellantis NV – would be exempt from his tariffs for a month.
In February, Trump took a step forward on his plan to put reciprocal tariffs on U.S. trading partners by signing a memo directing staff to come up with solutions in 180 days. Trump previously said he would put those tariffs in place on April 2 to avoid any confusion on April 1.
In his joint address to Congress on Tuesday, Trump said all countries would have to either make their products in the U.S. or be subject to tariffs.
“Whatever they tariff us, we tariff them. Whatever they tax us, we tax them,” Trump said. “If they do non-monetary tariffs to keep us out of their market, then we do non-monetary barriers to keep them out of our market. We will take in trillions of dollars and create jobs like we have never seen before.”
The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA, governs trade between the U.S. and its northern and southern neighbors. It went into force on July 1, 2020. Trump signed the deal. That agreement continued to allow for duty-free trading between the three countries for products largely made in North America.
U.S. goods and services trade with USMCA totaled an estimated $1.8 trillion in 2022. Exports were $789.7 billion and imports were $974.3 billion. The U.S. goods and services trade deficit with USMCA was $184.6 billion in 2022, according to the Office of the United States Trade Representative.
