Also: Goldman's Greensky sale, Evergrande bankruptcy, Better IPO. 
Good morning, Peter Vanham here in Geneva.
As Republican attacks on “DEI” (diversity, equity, and inclusion) and “ESG” (environmental, social, and governance) practices continue, business leaders are responding in a rather pragmatic way: They’re sticking with the embattled practices, while avoiding the acronyms.
We’ve pointed this out anecdotally a few times before in CEO Daily. But now there’s a new data point on the trend from a Bloomberg survey released this week. The main finding:
“About two-thirds of respondents in a survey of roughly 300 Bloomberg terminal users said the anti-ESG movement that started in the U.S. last year will force firms to stop using those three letters in conversations with clients. However, they’ll continue to incorporate environmental, social and governance metrics in their business, they also said.”
Some even happily stick with the labels in more explicit ways. This week I spoke with Graham Weaver, the founder and CEO of Alpine Investors. The private equity firm was one of the first in its sector to pursue the “B Corp” certification, with a particular interest in hiring, talent development, and retention practices.
“It doesn’t feel to me like there’s a big conflict [between B Corp practices and performance],” he told me. “If what I described to you about treating people well, getting a high [net promoter score], and creating an environment where people want to work, conflicted with high performance that would create a lot of tension. But it has not. The two have supported each other.”
As a case in point, Alpine has made its track record of hiring 50% women and one-third minority candidates a key differentiator to other private equity firms. Doing so increased the fund’s performance, Weaver told me. The firm claims it’s the best place to work among America’s top business school graduates. “We’re attracting the world’s greatest people,” he said. “And they want to spend not two years, but 20 years [with us].”
He also pointed out the bottom line of his embrace of ESG and DEI.
“This is not fluff and happy talk. This works. This is the formula for success,” he said. “This is not about sounding good or looking good. Our investors care about dollars in and out. They are investing in us because of our performance, at the end of the day. Perhaps they like the ‘B Corp’ label, but we doubled our fund size [to $4.5 billion] because of our performance.”
More news below.
Peter Vanham
peter.vanham@fortune.com
@petervanham
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Dumping Greensky
Goldman Sachs may be close to selling lender Greensky, just over a year after buying it for $1.7 billion. The investment bank is unwinding an expensive foray into consumer banking and has already taken a $504 million writedown on Greensky, which offers home improvement loans. Apollo Global and Sixth Street are some of the firms interested in buying the fintech service. Fortune
Evergrande bankruptcy
Troubled Chinese real estate developer China Evergrande Group filed for Chapter 15 bankruptcy protection on Thursday as it tries to restructure its foreign debt. Creditors will vote on the developer's debt restructuring deal later this month. Evergrande defaulted on its offshore debt in December 2021, helping to spark China’s real estate crisis that's now threatening fellow developer Country Garden. The Wall Street Journal
Better tries to get better
Softbank-backed Better plans to go public next week in a rare SPAC merger. The mortgage company has lost 91% of its workforce since the end of 2021 and posted a $880 million net loss last year. But Better needs money to ride out the mortgage downturn: “Cash is very important,” Better CEO Vishal Garg, who's personally on the hook to Softbank for any potential losses, said in an interview. Fortune
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