Statement from Patrick McCully, Climate and Energy Program Director at Rainforest Action Network
“BlackRock CEO Larry Fink’s annual letter lays down the gauntlet to other mega-money managers to also get serious about pushing corporations out of fossil fuels. One fellow Wall Street billionaire who needs to take note — and take action — is Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase. JPMorgan is the world’s seventh biggest asset manager with over $2 trillion in assets under management.
“While it has been widely reported that JPMorgan Chase is the world’s biggest lender and underwriter to fossil fuel companies, it has been less reported that it holds billions of dollars of fossil fuel company stocks and bonds through its asset management arm. JPMorgan asset management has an atrocious record of voting against shareholder resolutions on climate change and has zero commitments to divest any coal, gas or oil assets.
“With Fink’s seeming conversion to climate responsibility, this leaves Jamie Dimon as very clearly the dirty billionaire of Wall Street.”
“Beyond fossil fuels, US asset managers were implicated in connection with many of the bad actors responsible for last year’s tragic fires across the Amazon and a serious approach to the climate crisis must also address their role in financing deforestation.”
###