State Treasurer Shawn Wooden has instructed his investment team to divest Connecticut’s pension funds from Russian-owned assets in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The retirement funds, valued at $47 billion, currently hold Russia-domiciled investments worth more than $218 million in equity and fixed income, the treasurer’s office said. Those holdings will be eliminated, not only to condemn Russia’s actions, but because the Russian invasion creates “substantial risk for Connecticut’s investments,” according to treasury officials.
“The Ukrainian people are experiencing an assault on their freedom and suffering devastating human loss due to an unprovoked and unjustified attack by the Russian government,” Wooden said in a statement Tuesday. “The world’s condemnation is clear, and economic sanctions have paralyzed the Russian economy. We cannot stand idly by as the humanitarian crisis unfolds and Russian markets crumble, and I cannot continue to invest these pension funds in a way that runs counter to the foreign policy and national interests of the United States.”
The Connecticut Retirement Plans and Trust Funds have been gradually reducing their stake in Russian-owned assets since 2014, when Russia seized Crimea from Ukraine. Sanctions imposed by past presidential administrations, along with continued Russian cyberattacks against Western targets and alleged interference in the 2016 presidential election, “have made the Russian markets less favorable relative to others,” treasury officials said.
Governments around the world have imposed increasingly severe economic sanctions against Russia since its Feb. 24 large-scale attack on Ukraine. The sanctions have targeted prominent Russian individuals, banks, businesses and monetary exchanges.
