BlackRock Removes Wal-Mart, Dicks From "Socially Conscious" ETFs Over Gun Sales

Zerohedge reports:

In what may be its grandest - if most hollow - virtue signaling gesture to date, BlackRock is planning to strip shares of major gun retailers like Wal-Mart, Dick's Sporting Goods and Kroger from several "environmental social and governance focused funds" as the world's largest asset manager races to cash in on the market for ESG products, which have been rapidly growing in popularity.

Effectively BlackRock is offering is offering gun-free versions of IWM and AGG. Why? So that even more people will buy its segmented, "socially responsible" products of course and feel good about themselves, while making sure that Larry Fink's 2018 bonus is an all time high.

Even though Wal-Mart, Dick's and other retailers raised the age limit for buying assault rifles to 21, among other measures, in the wake of the Valentine's Day massacre at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., the Wall Street Journal reported that BlackRock will exclude these retailers on the basis that haven't stopped selling guns altogether. Shortly after the shooting, BlackRock said it would speak with weapons manufacturers to "understand their responses" to the second-deadliest public school shooting in US history.

The empty virtue signalling of BlackRock.