BNY Mellon’s depositary receipts (DR) division has teamed up with Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) environmental, social and governance (ESG) research.
The partnership will support global issuers in identifying risks, opportunities and will provide its DR clients with the means to measure how the market perceives them from an ESG perspective.
Through MSCI ESG research, DR clients will gain insight into how their ESG performance measures against competitors, utilising MSCI ESG ratings, ESG queries, industry trends, and country governance reports.
MSCI’s global ESG dataset will also be available to BNY Mellon’s DR ESG advisory team, facilitating client research in the form of peer benchmarking and shareholder ESG analysis.
According to BNY Mellon, ESG-considered assets under management are approaching $23 trillion, or 26 percent, of all professionally managed assets globally.
Christopher Kearns, CEO of BNY Mellon's DR business, said: “Our research illustrates companies are becoming more socially responsible and are increasing their outreach to ESG investors as potential new sources of investment.”
He added: “We are excited to work with MSCI ESG Research to provide clients with actionable information from the world’s leading provider of environmental, social and governance research.”
Linda-Eling Lee, managing director and global head of ESG research at MSCI, commented: “In 2017, MSCI ESG research saw the response and inquiry rate from companies that are constituents of the MSCI all country world index grow to 43 percent from 30 percent the year before and from just 15 percent in 2014.”
She added: “This trend suggests that companies are becoming more engaged on ESG issues as institutional investors take these issues more systematically into their analysis when they make investment decisions.”
