It’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for: S&P Dow Jones Indices, one of the world’s leading providers of financial market indices, and RobecoSAM, the investment specialist focused exclusively on Sustainability Investing, today announced the results of the annual Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (“DJSI”) review.
The components list for the DJSI will be published on the Sustainability Indices website on Monday, September 14, 2015. All changes are effective on Monday, September 21, 2015.
Launched in 1999, the DJSI World is the first global index to track the leading sustainability-driven companies worldwide based on RobecoSAM’s analysis of financially material Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) factors. RobecoSAM invited the world’s largest 3,400 companies from developed and emerging markets to take part in its annual Corporate Sustainability Assessment (CSA). This year, RobecoSAM assessed 85 percent of the invited universe’s free float market capitalization, for the DJSI review.
The three largest additions (by free-float market capitalization) to the DJSI World this year are Bank of America Corp, Telefonica SA and BHP Billiton Ltd; while Cisco Systems Inc, PepsiCo Inc and Royal Bank of Canada were deleted from this year’s Index, though information as to the reason for the deletions was not available as of press time.
Guido Giese,Head of Indices at RobecoSAM said:“Over the years the DJSI index family has not only come to be the gold standard for corporate sustainability but has also become a competitive platform where companies receive recognition for their sustainability practices. The CSA is a state of the art, in-depth sustainability performance assessment methodology. Thanks to its broad reach, the results of the CSA are one of the leading sources of information on how listed companies around the globe are exercising financially material ESG practices. The entire DJSI index family benefits from that.”
“More and more investors look at companies’ environmental policies and track records in making their investment decisions,” said David Blitzer, Managing Director and Chairman of the Index Committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices. “The Dow Jones Sustainability Indices are comprehensive benchmarks that allow investors to gauge the collective performance of those companies that meet the RobecoSAM standard for corporate sustainability and to formulate global allocations consistent with sustainable investment standards and practices.”
The Corporate Sustainability Leaders
RobecoSAM identifies the top scoring company in each of the 24 industry groups (according to GICS). The 2015-2016 Industry Group Leader profiles can be found on the Sustainability Indices website.
Sustainable Brands member companies making the index include BASF (for the 15th consecutive year) and Bank of America (which was re-added this year after being deleted last year) and The Hershey Company, along with Unilever, which has been named as a leader of the Food, Beverage and Tobacco Industry Group — one of only 24 companies to be named as Industry Group Leaders.
Unilever achieved an overall score of 92 out of a possible 100, an increase from 90 in 2014.
Jeff Seabright, Chief Sustainability Officer at Unilever, said: “It is an honor to be awarded industry group leadership. My thanks goes to everyone who was involved in our submission. The results reflect the progress we are making in delivering the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan, driving long-term sustainable business growth and towards achieving our vision of making sustainable living commonplace.”
Observations from this year’s DJSI Review
The CSA consists of over 100 financially material criteria. An analysis of this year’s review provides insight into the business practices of the world’s largest companies. Listed below are some of the most notable observations from the 2015 Review:
