Nasdaq Board Diversity Rules Blocked in Response to National Center Lawsuit

Wokeness is in retreat, but Nasdaq’s ‘diversity rules’ show its awful stench will be hard to eliminate

Appeals Court Strikes Down Nasdaq’s Board-Diversity Rules

Death of Nasdaq Diversity Rule Signals More Trouble for DEI

1792 Exchange + UNI Joint Letter

Corporate Consistency Across Markets: New Arabic Ratings

Faith-based investors should act like owners

Earlier this summer, the rating service Morningstar released its second-ever report on faith-based investing, a market that has grown to roughly $169 billion in assets. The report analyzes hundreds of faith-based funds, comparing their screening methodologies and how those screens affect portfolio construction and performance. The report offers valuable insight into a complex and rapidly growing segment of the investment industry, but it overlooks several important aspects of the broader faith-based investing landscape. ​​For starters, the universe of investors making decisions based on values is much broader than the funds formally labeled “faith-based” because no investment strategy is truly values-neutral. Every fund makes choices about which companies and industries to include, which to exclude, and how heavily to weight them. Even a broad-market index reflects a set of rules determining what qualifies for inclusion and how much representation each company receives within the portfolio. Every investor has some worldview or set of values that informs how he or she lives. Faith-based investing simply makes the connection between those values and investment decisions more explicit and, hopefully, more consistent. Investors who fall outside the Islamic, Catholic, and Christian categories examined by Morningstar may still make investment decisions based on deeply held beliefs about …

Two DEI Settlements, One Clear Warning for Federal Contractors

As the saying goes, “To be forewarned is to be forearmed.” American companies doing business with the federal government have once again been forewarned about the risks of engaging in DEI practices. To ignore these warnings can be very costly for the company, its shareholders, and employees.  Just four months ago, IBM paid more than $17 million to resolve allegations that it maintained illegal diversity, equity, and inclusion practices while performing federal contract work. That settlement was the first resolution under the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Fraud Initiative. It was also a clear warning. Last week, President Donald Trump’s DOJ announced that another top federal contractor has agreed to pay $21.5 million to settle similar allegations. The Justice Department alleged that Deloitte violated the False Claims Act by certifying compliance with federal nondiscrimination rules while applying race and sex preferences in hiring, promotions, and staffing. Business units tracked “demographic goals” with color-coded scorecards, and roughly 150 of the firm’s most senior leaders were evaluated, and in some cases compensated, based in part on progress toward those targets.  The government further alleged that promotion classes for partners were assigned racial and sex targets, that staffing for federal contracts was managed with a priority toward demographic parity …