The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has won its greenwashing civil penalty action against Vanguard.
The Federal Court has found Vanguard Investments Australia contravened the law by making misleading claims about certain environmental, social and governance (ESG) exclusionary screens applied to investments in a Vanguard index fund.
At a hearing before Justice O’Bryan on 8 March 2024, Vanguard admitted to engaging in conduct that was liable to mislead the public and that it had made representations that were false or misleading.
On 28 March 2024, Justice O’Bryan found that Vanguard contravened the ASIC Act numerous times when it made false or misleading representations about the ESG exclusionary screens that were applied to the Vanguard Ethically Conscious Global Aggregate Bond Index Fund.
Read More