FRIDAY WRAP: Clorox CEO's diversity call-out, no more severance silence, Tennessee bans drag as distraction politics, Vivek's presidential bid, solar misinformation, and avian flu

LIVE from your ESG compost bin, it’s a Business Pants Friday Show here at February 24th Lane Studios, featuring all your favorites: Ari the data queen, Jessie the money whisperer, BS-man Matt Moscardi. On today’s weekly wrap up: woke CEO stuff, farmers who like to fix stuff, god-fearing ESG haters, and god-fearing sun-haters!

Story of the Week (DR):

1. Setting a new mission for the World Bank

1. In nominating Ajay Banga, the former C.E.O. of Mastercard, to become president of the World Bank, the Biden administration isn’t just picking a veteran financial executive. It’s also looking to refocus the institution on climate change.

2. At Mastercard he made climate change a signature issue: During his tenure as C.E.O., the company announced the creation of the Priceless Planet Coalition, a group of about 100 firms that make corporate investments to preserve the environment.

3. That’s a marked difference from the current president of the World Bank. David Malpass announced this month that he would step down by June, a year before his term expires. Malpass, who was picked by former President Donald Trump, was criticized by environmental advocates for not focusing on the World Bank’s climate agenda.

2. People of Color Fill One Out of Five Board Seats for the First Time

1. Black directors now hold 8.3% of all board seats, up from 4.4% four years ago.  Asian directors (7.2%); Hispanic directors (3.6%). The study measured boards of the largest 3,000 U.S. businesses from Jan. 1, 2019 through Jan. 1, 2023.

3. The Biggest CEO-Worker Pay Gaps in America

1. CEO-worker ratios and pay rates are based on company reports for the S&P 500 and Russell 1000 members based on filings as of Feb. 3, 2023, with most companies currently reporting earnings for mid- to late 2022.

2. Amazon

1. CEO  Andy Jassy Pay: $212.7 million

2. Median Worker Pay: $32,855

3. CEO-Worker Pay Ratio: 6,474:1

4. CEO Pay Change Percent: +12,546.9%

5. Why the Pay Change? Stock options that will vest over 10 years” 

6. BS: This is Bezos World: Even as non-CEO he’s at 68%; pay committee is 6.57%, just under Jassy’s 6.72%

1. Jeff Bezos finally collected the Légion d'honneur awarded by France about a decade ago at a 'secret' ceremony, report says

1. President Emmanuel Macron presented the Amazon founder with the Légion d'honneur at a "secret" private ceremony on February 16.

1. About 2,200 French citizens and 300 foreigners are awarded the Légion d'honneur annually. It's intended to honor individuals who've served France or upheld its ideals, according to the award's website.

2. The ceremony, which was attended by a small group of elite guests, wasn't announced by the Elysée Palace, France's equivalent of the White House, and didn't appear in Macron's official calendar. 

3. The ceremony for the world's third-richest person ($119B)n was held on the same day as nationwide strike action against Macron's plan to raise the retirement age in France to 64. 

1. François Piquemal, a lawmaker for the left-wing La France Insoumise (Unbowed France) party tweeted: "Always and forever, everything for the rich, nothing for the people."

2. His colleague Alma Dufour condemned Macron for honoring a man whom she said had "contributed to the destruction of 85,000 retail jobs in France." She tweeted: "Tell me who your friends are, I'll tell you who you are."

8. Judith Mcgrath, Chair of Pay, 1.5% influence

1. Bottom quartile CEO Pay Ratio

4. Clorox CEO Linda Rendle Calls Out Limited Diversity at Top Consumer Event AB JS MM

1. As she wrapped up Clorox’s presentation Thursday at the Consumer Analyst Group of New York forum, a confab in which executives pitch investors and analysts on their companies, Rendle pointed out that only a handful of women were representing consumer-goods firms on stage.

2. “It’s great to see the diversity improving in this room, but I have to make a note that the diversity on this stage is not where it needs to be.” Most of the consumers the industry serves are women, Rendle said. Her fellow CEOs are taking diversity “very seriously,” she said, but she still didn’t see “enough people of color” among the speakers.

3. BS: Board female influence 52% (a shade over body representation of 50%); 3 of 4 other leadership roles held by men except nomination committee, which is also ⅔ women

Goodliest of the Week (AB):

1. Companies can't enforce silence for severance pay, Labor Board rules DR MM JS

1. On Tuesday, the National Labor Relations Board rules that employers can no longer demand laid-off employees avoid publicly talking crap about the company as part of their severance agreements AND they can’t stop employees from disclosing the terms of their exit packages. 

2. BNP Paribas is the first commercial bank to be sued over its fossil-fuel financing

1. Yesterday, 3 climate-activist groups sued the bank BNP Paribas over its fossil-fuel financing, saying it violated a French law requiring companies to prevent risks to the environment.

2. BNP Paribas is a top financier of fossil-fuel production in Europe, and 10th in the world, providing about $142 billion to the sector since 2016.

3. Activists say that pledges made by BNP Paribas and other banks to limit support of oil and gas have a bunch of loopholes; for example, BNP Paribas doesn’t directly finance oil projects, but the bank continues to offer corporate financing to its energy-firm clients that are advancing them. 

3. Justice Department Says John Deere Should Let Farmers Repair Their Tractors

1. Last month, Forest River Farms launched a class action lawsuit against John Deere accusing them of violating antitrust laws with its repair policies, including putting software locks on their tractors and restricting access to repair tools.

2. On Monday, the DOJ filed a "statement of interest" in the class action lawsuit siding with the farmers and blasting the company's arguments saying that when tractors break, “repair markets function poorly, agriculture suffers. Crops waste. Land lies fallow.”

Assholiest of the Week (MM):

1. Humanity

1. Invasion of the super pigs? Hybrid species could wreak havoc in the United States

1. In order to sell more pigs in Canada, they bred wild boars (dangerous) with farm pigs (delicious) to make “super pigs”

1. The pigs apparently are incredibly smart and have learned to move nocturnally, burrow from danger, and survive in much harsher climates than regular pigs

2. The pigs are also like killer bees - they’re aggressive and dangerous, and they roam in packs and attack if provoked at all

3. They’re also wild now and climate change is pushing them into the US

4. While it would seem like “just hunt them for bacon”, they apparently eat all the wildlife before you can even find them - including whole elk - and they are destroying cropland faster than they can be stopped

2. Record-Breaking February Heat Wave Hits Southern U.S.—As D.C. Could Break 150-Year-Old Record

3. Microsoft is loosening the limits on Bing AI chatbot conversations that it put into effect just days ago because users didn't like them

4. This bra tracks your vital signs

2. Distraction politics AB JS

1. Tennessee is set to become the first US state to ban drag

2. Pence's nonprofit rolls out digital ad campaign to take on ESG

1. “This is Bill. Unfortunately, Bill’s retirement savings has been invested in risky, woke priorities like overpriced green energy projects and creating meat-free hamburgers. Bill’s retirement benefits used to be protected from being gambled on money losing woke investments, but Biden removed the protections putting his priorities over your financial future. Good luck Bill.”

3. Proving it’s theater: BlackRock's $4 Billion of Texas Assets Undercuts Abbott's Anti-ESG ... - Bloomberg

3. The Prince of Distraction Politics, Vivek DR

1. A Wealthy ‘Anti-Woke’ Activist Joins the 2024 Presidential Field

1. Did you know: Vivek searched far and wide, using merit as his sole criteria after making millions of dollars at Roivant, for a co-founder of his anti-woke fund, Strive.  He hired: his high school buddy who was leading sales and distribution for Anheuser, who’s prior investing experience was a summer internship!

2. Did you know: The one woman Vivek chose for his board at Roivant, using a meritocratic system, was… an ESG equity analyst at Goldman Sachs!

3. Did you know: when looking for independent, highly qualified voices for his board, Vivek asked… his old boss at QVT to join, who also went to Harvard and also worked at Goldman Sachs!

4. Did you know: 7 of the 9 board members at Roivant went to Harvard, and 66% of the board have connections through other boards too!  Having friends is fun!

5. Did you know: Vivek’s highly successful, incredibly capitalist company announced a banner quarter, having only lost 385m… in 3 months, on track for over 1.1bn in losses for 2022!

2. Long Live Desantis, the King

Exhausting-est of the Week (JS):

1. An activist group is spreading misinformation to stop solar projects in rural America AB MM

1. Solar energy companies are offering to lease farmland in rural Page County, VA to build solar plants

2. The particular farmer highlighted in the article said he would make more money leasing his farmland than he would make selling his cattle and growing hay. He also liked the idea of his land remaining one parcel

3. BUT THEN ENTER…Citizens for Responsible Solar was started in 2019 by longtime political operative, Susan Ralston. She worked in the White House under George W. Bush and still has deep ties to power players in conservative politics. When Ralston launched the group, a consulting firm she owns got hundreds of thousands of dollars from the foundation of a leading GOP donor who is also a major investor in fossil fuel companies.

4. The group's website says solar requires too much land for "unreliable energy," ignoring data showing power grids can run dependably on lots of renewables. And it claims large solar projects in rural areas wreck the land and contribute to climate change, despite evidence to the contrary. This misinformation is turning rural landowners unfairly against renewables

2. White House safety violation ceiling DR

1. Under current law, the White House said, the highest fine that can be charged to companies for violations involving the transportation of hazardous materials is $225,455. That’s less than 1% of Norfolk Southern’s profits last year.

2. The White House is calling on congressional Republicans to increase the fines levied on rail companies for safety violations

3. Elon Musk's new Silicon Valley engineering headquarters will focus on AI

1. But…will he pay rent? Elon Musk’s Twitter hasn’t been paying its rent, now one of its landlords has defaulted on its loans

2. Not even 10 days ago he was issuing warnings against AI: “One of the biggest risks to the future of civilization is AI,” Musk told attendees at the World Government Summit in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, shortly after mentioning the development of ChatGPT. “It’s both positive or negative and has great, great promise, great capability,” Musk said. But, he stressed that “with that comes great danger.”

Who Won the Week?

1. DR: Pea Milk (third of the saturated fat and 50% more calcium than cow’s milk)

2. AB: Soy, oats and almonds! FDA says we can keep calling plant-based milk, MILK and that U.S. consumers are NOT confused by this label, no matter what the dairy lobby argues about the cultural appropriation of milk.

3. MM:  We did, because a big investor just bought themselves some board sabermetrics and you can expect way more “against” votes this proxy season

4. JS: 

Predictions

1. DR: John Kim, EVP Chief Product Officer PayPal, is next CEO: fulfilling my prediction “2023 adds an east Asian CEO hire”

2. AB:  Last week’s 192-page document filing in the $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox Corporation will give Dominion Voting Systems the win in next month’s trial. 

3. MM: I predict a major outbreak of H5N1, the avian flu that kills 60% of humans it infects, starts in Cambodia as the flu becomes human-to-human transmissible.  The first case is this story from yesterday: Bird flu has reportedly killed a Cambodian girl and sickened others. What you need to know about H5N1 

1. The business media will then report it as “a supply chain disruption”, and the stock market will focus on Adidas as a big loser because their supply chain is dead: Cambodia Is Adidas’ Biggest Apparel Supplier as Sportswear Giant Shifts Production Out of China

2. Adidas will declare bankruptcy after losing more than 1bn on Kanye’s truly horrific shoes and due to their entire supply chain being “disrupted” by mass death