HEDGE FUND CHIEF OPTS FOR SOCIALLY-RESPONSIBLE INVESTING

Jeff Ubben is moving on from ValueAct Capital and its $16-billion fund to focus on environmentally and socially-responsible investing, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday, June 23, 2020.

Ben Winck of Business Insider said on June 24, 2020 that Ubben will concentrate on a new hedge fund named Inclusive Capital Partners - will be launched in partnership with Lynn Forester de Rothschild, CEO of the Coalition for Inclusive Capitalism, according to the Times. Ubben hopes to employ the strategy he used with ValueAct's primary fund and focus on implementing strategy changes at specific companies.

"Companies, as governed today, with investors asking for more current returns and more buybacks and so forth, aren't working for society or nature," he told the Times. "But I have to prove that there's a return, because otherwise ... you're not really changing anything."

Many of the opportunities in traditional investing are drying up and creating a greater incentive for impact strategies, Ubben said. "Finance is, like, done. Everybody's bought everybody else with low-cost debt. Everybody's maximized their margin," he said. "They've bought all their shares back ... There's nothing there. Every industry has about three players. Elizabeth Warren is right." The move comes after a drawn-out transfer of power from Ubben to others at the $16 billion hedge fund. The investor passed on the role of chief investment officer in 2017 and relinquished the CEO title last year to his successor.