Stellar Blade developer Shift Up officially went public and raised $320 million in its IPO. However, it was also revealed that the company is hiring an employee to publish ESG reports now.
Eve in Stellar Blade (2024), Shift Up
Games Industry reports the IPO is the largest one in South Korea in over 2 years and the first to raise over $50 million since PUBG developer Krafton raised $3.8 billion in 2021.
In fact, it was the second largest IPO in South Korea in 2024 only behind HD Hyundai Marine Solution’s $553 million offering earlier this year.
Eve in Stellar Blade (2024), Shift Up
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After the company went public, a job posting on the company’s website was discovered by X user Pandacasual for an IR Representative or Manager. One of the duties of this position is to lead a team in the publication of ESG reports.
Shift Up is hiring. Do you have skills in ESG to please all the new investors? Apply today!https://t.co/D8ELctKOYS pic.twitter.com/y47u1SnL2i
— GIGABEAR (@Pandacausal) July 11, 2024
ESG stands for Environment, social and governance, and many companies have them in order to obtain money through various ESG funds. However, according to a report in the Harvard Business Review these funds have not performed well.
Sanjai Bhagat explained at the end of March 2022, “To begin with, ESG funds certainly perform poorly in financial terms. In a recent Journal of Finance paper, University of Chicago researchers analyzed the Morningstar sustainability ratings of more than 20,000 mutual funds representing over $8 trillion of investor savings. Although the highest rated funds in terms of sustainability certainly attracted more capital than the lowest rated funds, none of the high sustainability funds outperformed any of the lowest rated funds.”
Eve in Stellar Blade (2024), Shift Up
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Not only do they perform poorly, but they don’t actually deliver on what they promise, Bhagat details, “ESG funds don’t seem to deliver better ESG performance either. Researchers at Columbia University and London School of Economics compared the ESG record of U.S. companies in 147 ESG fund portfolios and that of U.S. companies in 2,428 non-ESG portfolios. They found that the companies in the ESG portfolios had worse compliance record for both labor and environmental rules. They also found that companies added to ESG portfolios did not subsequently improve compliance with labor or environmental regulations.”
Bhagat even goes on to note that “ESG targets may actually distort decision making.”
Eve in Stellar Blade (2024), Shift Up
In fact, a report from The Wall Street Journal noted that a branch of ESG, DEI or Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion is indeed a scam based off of faulty research done by an activist organization called McKinsey.
James Mackintosh reported, “Academics have tried to repeat McKinsey’s findings and failed, concluding that there is in fact no link between profitability and executive diversity. And the methodology of McKinsey’s early studies, which helped create the widespread belief that diversity is good for profits, is being questioned.”
Eve in Stellar Blade (2024), Shift Up
As former World of Warcraft Team Lead Mark Kern notes, “we have to see what the final reports focus on.”
Shift Up has fallen.
After going public, they will be required to publish ESG reports.
Everyone does this, including Tesla, so we have to see what the final reports focus on. https://t.co/VL52wGe6Y3
— Grummz (@Grummz) July 12, 2024
What do you make of Shift Up hiring an employee who will lead a team in developing ESG reports?
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