The Loring, Wolcott & Coolidge Office offers specialized services for socially responsible investors. Our services include integrating corporate responsibility criteria in the portfolio management process, the placement of community development investments, and active participation in the proxy voting process and ongoing shareholder engagement.
Screening for Corporate Responsibility
Most investors who integrate social and ethical criteria into their portfolios do so by purchasing stocks and bonds of companies that meet a broad range of criteria. These criteria typically encompass both the historic avoidance areas of alcohol, tobacco, gambling, nuclear power and military weaponry, and positive criteria of community relations, environment, employee relations, diversity, and human rights. Portfolios can be tailored to address additional screens identified by the client. Social investors count themselves among a well-established community working towards a better world with their investment dollars while maintaining competitive financial performance.
Community Development Investing
An ever-increasing number of social investors choose to allocate a proportion of their assets to nontraditional investments that have a high social impact. These investments provide the necessary capital base for community development institutions to make loans to traditionally un-bankable populations through either federally insured market-rate deposits in community development credit unions and banks, or low-interest loans to community development loan funds. Loring, Wolcott & Coolidge is one of the largest private client managers of community investments with over $25 million under management. Clients may choose community investments that meet a broad set of social impact goals, or specific interests, such as business development on Native American reservations, organic farming, or urban homelessness. International community investments are also available to focus on microfinance lending, small-scale alternative energy projects, and environmentally friendly fair trade agriculture.
Proxy Voting and Ongoing Shareholder Engagement
Trustees at the Loring, Wolcott & Coolidge Office adopt Proxy Voting Guidelines every year and regularly vote all issues, including an increasing number of corporate governance and corporate social responsibility proxy resolutions. Loring, Wolcott & Coolidge also advocates selectively for clients’ interests through the engagement process – a collaborative dialogue with corporate management and other interested shareholders about social and environmental issues such as water conservation, equal employment policies, and suburban sprawl. Core tenets to the voting are transparency, disclosure and fairness.
