As You Sow, a nonprofit organization that promotes environmental and social corporate responsibility, is launching a new tool to screen mutual funds and ETFs for gender equality.
The search tool, called the Gender Equality Funds, is the fifth in a series of free, online tools created by As You Sow that allows investors to use various screens on their investments.
The Gender Equality tool provides a database that enables individual and institutional investors to apply a gender lens to mutual fund and ETF investments.
The tool will include about 5,000 of the most commonly held U.S. mutual funds, including financial giants like Vanguard, BlackRock, and State Street, against a database detailing individual company performance on 12 key gender equality performance indicators.
The indicators will measure policies that demonstrate a commitment to gender diversity and gender balance in the overall leadership, management and workforce of companies. The information will then be used to give each fund a gender equality portfolio score.
The tool will promote transparency and encourage fund managers to construct and offer investment vehicles that are sympathetic to gender parity, ultimately exerting market pressure on companies to improve their performance on gender issues, according to As You Sow.
“The new tool empowers investors to see what is hidden within the mutual funds that comprise the bulk of their retirement savings and 401(k) plans,” said Andrew Behar, CEO of As You Sow. “The first step is to know what you own — then you can use the power of your capital to invest in companies that have policies and practices that promote gender equality.”
As You Sow will use Morningstar and Equileap, a data organization on gender equality, to compile the ratings.