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From the opinion pages of the Wall Street Journal, this is Potomac Watch.

A new study of asset managers shows which financial firms are voting for ESG proposals

as Baltimore joins other cities in suing Hyundai and Kia, saying their cars are too easy to steal.

Welcome, Kyle Peterson with the Wall Street Journal.

We are joined today by my colleague, columnist, Alicia Finley. Welcome, Alicia.

The rise of investing based on environmental, social, and governance factors, often called ESG,

has put enormous power in the hands of big financial firms.

The study that we're talking about today was written up in the journal's editorial pages this week.

It comes from the committee to unleash prosperity.

And here is how that group's report frames the problem.

It says today more than half of the total investment in stock-based funds is allocated to passively managed ETFs and index funds,

which simply mirror benchmarks such as the S&P 500.

Here's why that's significant as explained in a 2022 report prepared by the Republican staff of the Senate Banking Committee.

A retail investor who buys index funds does not own the stocks in the fund, those stocks instead are owned by the fund,

which means that the funds manager may vote those shares.

So, Alicia, what the community and leash prosperity has done is they've looked at the results of voting on 50 shareholder proposals

that they say are non-fiduciary related activist proposals, and then they check which asset managers voted for and against those things.

And what's your read of this study and the rankings and whether there are any surprises here?

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