{"id":176546,"date":"2026-06-25T05:37:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-25T05:37:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/176546\/"},"modified":"2026-06-25T05:37:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-25T05:37:12","slug":"la-caisse-says-direct-israel-exposure-is-less-than-250m","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/176546\/","title":{"rendered":"La Caisse says direct Israel exposure is less than $250M"},"content":{"rendered":"

Register for the upcoming Canada West Institutional Forum<\/a><\/p>\n

Advocacy groups and labor unions are calling on La Caisse de d\u00e9p\u00f4t et placement du Qu\u00e9bec (Caisse) to divest from dozens of companies they allege are complicit in violations of Palestinian rights.<\/p>\n

On June 18, the Quebec Coalition URGENCE Palestine and Just Peace Advocates\/Mouvement pour une paix juste released an analysis of La Caisse\u2019s 2025 annual report, arguing that, as of Dec. 31, 2025, the pension fund had $26.4B invested in 81 companies whose activities they alleged are linked to \u201cgenocide, occupation, colonization and violations of the Palestinian people\u2019s rights.\u201d The groups, together with several labor unions, also sent a letter to La Caisse calling on the pension fund to immediately divest from those holdings. Together, the organizations represent approximately 488,000 workers who contribute to the Quebec Pension Plan and the Pension Plan for Employees of the Government and Public Bodies, two of La Caisse\u2019s largest depositors.<\/p>\n

In a response published in La Presse, Charles Emond, president and chief executive officer of La Caisse, defended the fund\u2019s approach and said the organization is willing to meet with the signatories to discuss its investment practices.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe concerns raised regarding the humanitarian crisis in Palestine and the role institutional investors can play are legitimate,\u201d he said in his response. \u201cThis is a subject we are discussing with our teams, with all the necessary rigor given a situation we have repeatedly condemned. However, certain statements made about La Caisse in the letter from the CSN, the FAE and other union organizations deserve to be clarified. And the proposed solution needs to be examined more seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n

Emond noted that La Caisse\u2019s direct geographic exposure to Israel represents 0.04% of its overall portfolio, or less than $250M, with the remainder held through a small number of external managers. He also said La Caisse has prohibited any new investments in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, a step he said few institutional investors have taken.<\/p>\n

According to Emond, more than $10B of the holdings identified by the groups are concentrated in Microsoft, Alphabet and Amazon. He argued that the divestment campaign makes little distinction between companies directly involved in the defense sector and multinational technology, consumer and automotive firms whose products and services are used globally, including Ford, Toyota, Coca-Cola and Meta.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile several public fund managers hold the same securities \u2013 sometimes in much larger proportions \u2013 and while La Caisse has taken concrete steps by prohibiting any new investment in Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territory, which it is among the only institutional investors in the world to have done, it is striking to see that La Caisse is also being heavily targeted,\u201d Emond wrote.<\/p>\n

He further argued that divesting from 81 multinational companies would require withdrawing from a substantial portion of the global economy and could hinder the fund\u2019s ability to fulfill its mandate on behalf of Quebec pension beneficiaries. Emond also rejected comparisons with La Caisse\u2019s decision to exit Russian assets following the invasion of Ukraine, noting that those investments were subject to Canadian government sanctions, whereas the companies targeted by the campaign are global multinationals with only a portion of their activities connected to the conflict.<\/p>\n

While reaffirming La Caisse\u2019s commitment to sustainable investing, Emond said the fund would continue to engage with companies through direct dialogue and shareholder voting where appropriate.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur approach to sustainable investment is clear: where we are a significant shareholder, we act directly and will continue to do so,\u201d he said. \u201cIn other cases where our influence is more limited, we use the levers at our disposal \u2013 including shareholder voting \u2013 to make our expectations known and encourage companies to move in the right direction.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Register for the upcoming Canada West Institutional Forum Advocacy groups and labor unions are calling on La Caisse…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":176547,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[33],"tags":[53918,53919,53920,53921,44969,53922,53923,53924,53925,16230,25891,37,53926,53927,53928,53929],"class_list":["post-176546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-caisse","tag-caisse-de-depot-et-placement-du-quebec","tag-db-pension-plans","tag-defined-benfit-pension-plans","tag-divestment","tag-environmental-social-and-corporate-governance","tag-external-managers","tag-institutional-investing","tag-institutional-investments","tag-institutional-investors","tag-investment-management","tag-israel","tag-magnificent-7","tag-pension-stewardship","tag-public-equity","tag-sustainable-investing"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116809134457407572","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176546"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176546\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/176547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}