Greenwashing remains rampant among KiwiSaver fund managers, as investors grow more conscious about where their money goes to.
Photo: 123rf
Ethical investment group Mindful Money says responsible investment is on the rise and most funds claim to be doing it.
It says some funds are walking the talk, including AMP Capital's ethical funds and those by Pathfinder.
But Mindful Money chief executive Barry Coates says some are still investing billions of dollars into companies the public want to avoid.
"We're able to see that in the case of the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine and we found a number of funds that claim to be ethical and practise ESG [environmental, social and governance] management, actually had investments in major companies that are aligned to [Russian President Vladimir] Putin's regime.
"Some of them are state owned companies and they sometimes had investments in Russian government bonds. Those mechanisms have managed to finance Putin's regime," Coates said.
Coates said he was also amazed that local KiwiSaver fund managers continued to unknowingly put money into funds connected to nuclear weapons and other unethical ventures.
He said investments by New Zealand funds into companies that produced nuclear weapons totalled $15 million, down from a $100m three years ago.
But $15m isn't nothing, Coates said.
He said the money was often invested through index funds, which are not actively managed.
"We're still pressuring those funds to exit from nuclear weapons and we think it's completely incompatible with the spirit of KiwiSaver and with the wishes of the New Zealand public for these funds to be holding nuclear weapons."