Which financial sector players have most influence with the Bolsonaro government and Brazilian companies?

Institutions, Forceful stewardship, Biodiversity loss

Belatedly, attention is focusing on the crisis in the Amazon and inevitably people are asking who are the financial sector players that have most influence with the Brazilian government and corporations.

We couldn’t find an off the shelf source for this information. So an academic at Oxford University (Michael Urban) kindly agreed to help by analysing Lipper data on investment funds. We’ve focused on mutual funds and ETFs (since these are the biggest funds) that invest primarily in Brazil and aggregated assets under management by fund management companies (not the “investment advisors”). If you have data which confirms or challenges this listing, we’d very much like to hear from you.

But assuming it’s broadly accurate, now begins the challenging process of finding people within these companies – or family or colleagues near to decision-makers at these top 10 firms – who see the need to engage.

As The Economist warns, we are fast approaching an irreversible tipping point in the Amazon.

And it’s on our watch that this country is taking action which could have major negative consequences globally. It’s also a country which the UN Global Compact and UN PRI have said is a model for other emerging markets. In reality what we seem to have is a giant and globally relevant example of greenwish.

If you are willing to do something to help please send an email to [email protected] and put the “Amazon/Brazil” in the subject line. Please indicate how you think you can help and any information that’s relevant (eg your bio).  We have no paid staff so please excuse any delay in replying.

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