Thursday, March 24, 2016
Rockefeller Family Fund Divests from Fossil Fuels and Exxon
In a letter posted on its website, the Rockefeller Family Fund announced on Wednesday that it would divest from fossil fuels “as quickly as possible,” eliminating its holdings in ExxonMobil Corp., which it called “morally reprehensible.”
This is significant in that John D. Rockefeller Sr. made his money running Standard Oil, the company that evolved into ExxonMobil. Thus, by some lights, the fortune that the charitable fund is now divesting was made through that business. But another Rockefeller-associated foundation, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, led the way down this path, divesting in September 2014. . .