Corporate Responsibility
We believe that transparency, integrity, and a commitment to sustainable growth and innovation are essential to building trust and resilience across our business. Through our Corporate Responsibility Strategy, we drive value for shareholders, clients, employees, and communities while advancing progress toward a more sustainable future.
Our research demonstrates that sound sustainability and climate practices can better position companies for the future.1 As a leading provider of sustainability and climate transparency tools, we help capital markets participants gain clarity to navigate risks and identify opportunities. We also strive to demonstrate leading corporate responsibility practices. Our Materiality Assessment highlights our corporate sustainability priorities.
We regularly report on our website and in other disclosures about our sustainability actions and the progress of our sustainability commitments. Visit our Sustainability Reporting and Policies Hub for current and historical reports, disclosures and policies and our Investor Relations webpages with governance disclosures for more information.
“At MSCI, corporate responsibility is the foundation of everything we do. We aspire to demonstrate leading standards in how we manage our company and support our clients. With that in mind, MSCI has embedded responsible and sustainable practices throughout our operations, and we have seen how they can strengthen our performance. From casting a wide net to ensure we attract the best talent from around the world to sound governance and our drive for emissions reduction, these policies can help us build a more innovative, competitive, and resilient business.”
Environmental sustainability
While we believe that our environmental impact as an innovative company providing data and technology solutions to global institutional investors is relatively small, we take action to reduce our impact on the planet. We believe in being transparent about the progress we make toward our climate-related goals and how we address climate-related risks and opportunities.
Social practices
We are committed to retaining and developing our people to foster a high-performing workforce that drives innovation and delivers impactful products and research to the market. Our talent management, inclusion and belonging, learning and development, flexible work, and safety and well-being programs enable us to attract top talent and create an environment where employees are engaged and can thrive. Acting responsibly is also central to our approach to supply chain management and information security.
Responsible business and robust governance
We are committed to robust governance practices. Our governance structure is designed to oversee corporate strategy, key risks, and opportunities across our Board of Directors and management, helping to uphold high standards of integrity.
Enabling sustainable investing
Our extensive suite of data, metrics and tools are designed to help clients seize opportunities, manage risks, align with regulatory mandates and fulfil sustainability commitments.
“Our approach to corporate responsibility is grounded in transparency and action. That means building an inclusive culture, embedding responsibility into how we operate and delivering measurable progress toward our net-zero goals. By leading through our own actions, we strengthen our culture and set a clear example for how long-term value is created.”
Spotlight
We are committed to reaching net-zero by 2040, aligned with the Paris Agreement goal of limiting global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Our near-term, long-term and net-zero science-based CO2e emissions reduction targets have been validated by the Science Based Targets initiative.2
We set milestones to achieve the following in 2025: Source 100% renewable electricity, reduce absolute Scope 1 and 2 CO2e emissions by 60%, and increase to 60% by spend our suppliers with science-based targets.3
Our Board is actively engaged in overseeing MSCI’s corporate responsibility efforts.
1 For example, MSCI research found a significant historical correlation between a company’s MSCI ESG Rating and its financing costs. Companies assessed to be the most resilient to financially material sustainability-related risks consistently financed themselves more cheaply than those considered more vulnerable. See the full research paper, MSCI ESG Ratings and Cost of Capital: June 2024: MSCI ESG Ratings and Cost of Capital.
2 CO2e is a unit used to express the global warming potential of different greenhouse gases as a single figure, namely the equivalent amount or concentration of carbon dioxide.
3 2019 is the base year for our CO2e reduction targets.