White Oak Global Advisors entered a formal partnership with the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board, a global nonprofit founded to help businesses around the world identify, manage and report on sustainability issues. This partnership will enable White Oak to incorporate SASB’s standards into its ESG research and underwriting processes for prospective credit issuance.
“After careful review of several ESG evaluation standards, we determined that SASB has developed the gold standard globally for evaluating companies’ sustainability data, and we are pleased to further formalize our ESG risk management and underwriting processes by leveraging SASB standards as a baseline,” Andre Hakkak, CEO of White Oak, said. “This partnership underscores White Oak’s commitment to ensuring our underlying business processes create a variety of attractive ESG-compliant credit investment opportunities.”
White Oak also will leverage SASB’s membership and insights network to continue the firm’s existing ESG employee education efforts. Most recently, through the program, 27 White Oak professionals completed the PRI Academy’s Fundamentals of Responsible Investing (RI) course. Since its founding, White Oak and its affiliates have originated more than $8 billion in direct lending opportunities, over a third of which have been directed toward ESG and impact-oriented investments in the U.S. middle market.
“We view our adoption of the sustainability accounting standards as a continuation of our extensive efforts to create a private credit industry that benefits both borrowers and investors,” Terésa Cutter, managing director and head of ESG and impact at White Oak, said. “We’re focused on providing non-predatory loans and working together with borrowers — rather than taking control of governance — to successfully guide them to profitability and our investors to attractive returns.”
The Sustainability Accounting Standards Board developed a standard that focuses on financially material information in relation to companies’ sustainability data. Global investors with more than $48 trillion in assets under management have committed to upholding SASB standards with operations in more than 170 countries.
