An expert commission tasked by Norway’s government with evaluating a suggestion that the country’s US$1-trillion sovereign wealth fund divests from all its oil and gas investments has advised against such a divestment. Bloomberg quotes the report of the three-member commission as saying “If energy stocks are excluded from the fund, the composition of the investments will differ from market weights, and the fund will be expected to either achieve lower return or higher risk.” The commissioners also noted that divesting from oil and gas will do little to mitigate the sovereign fund’s exposure to oil price volatility, but at the same time, it would change what has until now been a “successful investment philosophy.” Norway’s Government Pension Fund Global, the largest sovereign wealth fund in the world, recommended the removal of oil and gas stocks—US$35 billion worth of shares—from the fund’s equity benchmark index last November. It said this […]