Wall Street is running away from DEI and yet its trade group continues to push and promote the dubiously legal hiring practice that critics claim leads to race- and gender-based quotas, On The Money has learned.
The Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, known widely on Wall Street by its acronym SIFMA, touts itself as the “voice of the nation’s securities industry.” It’s Wall Street’s advocate before lawmakers and the White House, whose central mission is to promote “effective and resilient capital markets.”
It also sees as part of its mission the advocacy of diversity, equity and inclusion policies, according to people close to the organization.
One member told On The Money that he attended the group’s legal conference earlier in the week in Austin, Texas, and shared with me its agenda. Among the highlights was a “DEI Advocate Award” and a party celebrating the intersectionality of the attendees.
SIFMA’s website, a member pointed out, is replete with DEI celebrations and advocacy. In 2023, the organization supported congressional legislation that would “increase gender, racial, and ethnic diversity on corporate boards,” which sure does sound like quotas of the variety the Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional that same year.
A little strange given the tenor of the times. This DEI obsession runs counter to the White House’s new color-blind hiring agenda, and that SCOTUS ruling striking down the use of race and sex in college admissions. Amid this sea change, SIFMA’s members — big banks and brokerages – are eschewing DEI and all forms of corporate wokeness. As I was first to report, Jamie Dimon joined other banks in exiting DEI, taking “equity” out of his diversity programs at JPMorgan.
Equity, of course, is a code word for quotas or guaranteed outcomes. Dimon and his fellow CEOs know they run businesses that are highly regulated by the president’s SEC, DOJ, Treasury Department and more. If they’re violating the law through DEI, they can face repercussions.
That’s why I pushed the flacks over at SIFMA for a simple explanation on why they would advocate policies that could get their members in trouble.
A spokeswoman for SIFMA defended the group’s diversity efforts, adding in a statement that “With respect to SIFMA’s policies, we are a member-led organization and as such our priorities are determined by our members and everything SIFMA does on behalf on the industry – broadly speaking and at all of our conferences – is always in full accordance with federal law.”
But some SIFMA members are critical of these woke, diversity efforts, which they say comes from the top of the organization. Its CEO and president, Ken Bentsen, was a liberal congressman from Texas (his uncle was Lloyd Bentsen, a long-time democratic Senator from Texas, VP candidate and Bill Clinton’s Treasury Secretary), who has made the place increasingly woke in messaging and practice, they add
Bentsen declined to comment through the spokeswoman.
Again, if Jamie Dimon, and the people at Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley say DEI is something that needs to go the way of the buggy whip, why are the people they are paying at SIFMA (through membership dues) still pushing it on its members and advocating it before Congress?
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