DJSI Europe launches in NYC; BMO Groupo captures the halo

The same week as season 4 of The Apprentice starts on NBC with Trump playing mentor in NYC, Alex Barkawi and his colleagues at SAM launched their DJSI in North America.

It is a significant development for SRI in the US. Other European-driven US ventures have started in the last 12 months: EIRIS have had a researcher on-shore since early 2005, while F&C launched a 2-person research shop in mid-2004. But the Dow Jones brand and distribution in the US, together with the global approach and solid method SAM uses, creates the potential for a significant shift in the competitive landscape.

The launch event for the Dow Jones Sustainability North America Index and Dow Jones Sustainability United States Index introduced in New York on 23 September included:

• Jane Ambachtsheer, Global Head of Socially Responsible Investing, Mercer Investment Consulting;
• Bailey Bishop, Principal, State Street Global Advisors; and
• John Prestbo, Editor, Dow Jones Indexes.

In a way that describes the mission-building nature of most ventures in the nascent SRI niche of the money management industry, Alex also invited me and SRI majors from KLD (the brains behind the Domini 400), Tom Kuh and Peter Kinder.

DJSI were launched in 1999. Based on the partnership of Dow Jones Indexes, STOXX Limited and SAM using "objective and professional benchmarks integrating economic, environment and social criteria". At August 31, over USD4 billion is managed against the DJSI by asset managers in 14 countries.

The Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes are based on a best-in-class approach and comprise the leading companies in terms of sustainability from each industry in the respective regions. The underlying evaluation by SAM covers general and industry specific sustainability criteria and accounts for long-term economic, environmental and social trends.

It is interesting that Northfield Info Systems of Boston - who have done work with KLD on their indices, was invloved too, according to Bill Baue at socialfunds.com:

"When conducting a study on socially responsible investing (SRI) indexes covering the US market, Northfield Information Services had to isolate US companies from the Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes (DJSI) World Index because DJSI did not offer a US index. That changes today, with the launch of the DJSI United States Index, comprised of 93 companies, as well as the DJSI North America, which adds 18 from Canada for a total of 111 components. "

Greenbiz also covered the story at Dow Jones Sustainability Index Launched for North America as well as posted to Canadian bank BMO Group which quickly incorporated coverage into its CR profile. How companies react to index inclusion/exclusion will make a neat academic study, and something I notcied when researching the JSE SRI Index last year for socialfunds.com.