Dear Mr. Gates,

By way of introduction, I would like to thank you for everything you and your wife Melinda’s foundation is doing to combat climate change. I read your excellent book “How to Avoid a Climate Disaster: The Solutions We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need.” In it you rightly note the important role that companies can play and state that “As an employee or shareholder, you can push your company to do its part.” You also point out that this will involve companies “accepting more risk” and that “Shareholders and board members will have to be willing to share in this risk, making it clear to executives that they’ll back smart investments even if they don’t ultimately pan out.” One of the smartest investments a long-term shareholder can make is a climate-informed vote.

NEW YORK, NEW YORK – NOVEMBER 06: Bill Gates, Co-Chair, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation speaks onstage at 2019 New York Times Dealbook on November 06, 2019 in New York City. (Photo by Mike Cohen/Getty Images for The New York Times) GETTY IMAGES FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust, with assets of around $51 billion, is the largest foundation in the U.S.—nearly four times larger than the number 2 Ford Foundation—and owns large equity positions in a limited number of companies. One of them is Berkshire Hathaway, where your foundation’s trust has a 3.07 percent stake in the class B shares (after Vanguard at 9.37, BlackRock at 5.53, and State Street Global Advisors at 5.48) making your trust the fourth largest class B holder. Furthermore, the trust’s stake in Berkshire Hathaway represents about 42 percent of its total equity portfolio. This is a high degree of investment concentration, so the fate of your endowment is heavily tied to the fate of this investment.

It is in this context that I am writing to ask you for two small favors. Both are easy to do and in your self-interest, although one is more awkward than the other, so we’ll start with that one.

The first favor is that I request  you call your good friend Warren Buffett, and ask him to vote in favor of the Berkshire Hathaway shareholder proposal submitted by the California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS), Federated Hermes, and Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ) which requests “that the board of the Company publish an annual assessment addressing how the Company manages physical and transitional climate-related risks and opportunities, commencing prior to its 2022 annual shareholders’ meeting.” For some further background, please see this correspondence between Mr. Timothy Youmans, Lead-North America for EOS at Federated Hermes, and Mr. Marc D. Hamburg, Senior Vice President at Berkshire Hathaway.

Source link for this article