ESG may exclude many firms say Cowen head

Companies that don’t fully engage with ESG may face total exclusion by investors, Larry Wieseneck, Cowen Co-President, has said.

Speaking at a conference for chief financial officers sponsored by the American Institute of CPAs, he said that firms that don’t move forward with ESG may become uninvestable and that all Wall Street research within 12 months will include an ESG score.

Nine out of 10 companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500 released sustainability reports in 2019 compared with just two out of 10 in 2011, the Institute said. Meanwhile, Robert Hirth, co-vice chair of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board said at the event, “Corporate reporting now has permanently expanded to include ESG performance. There’s absolutely an increased demand for this reporting and every publicly listed company will more than likely report some form of ESG information.”