Socially responsible investment (SRI) assets grew faster than the entire universe of managed assets in the U.S. during the last 10 years, reports The Social Investment Forum, the U.S. trade association for the SRI industry.

Total SRI assets rose more than 258% from $US639 billion in 1995 to $US2.29 trillion in 2005, while the broader universe of assets under professional management increased less than 249% from $US7 trillion to $US24.4 trillion over the same period.

According to the Forum report, the $US2.29 trillion in total assets under management is up from a total of $US2.16 trillion in 2003. During the last two years, there has been an 18.5% increase in assets invested in SRI mutual funds; a 16% jump in social and corporate governance shareholder resolutions (and significantly higher levels of support for such proxy measures); and a 40% boost in funds invested in community investing, it reports.

The $US2.29 trillion in SRI represents 9.4% of the $US24.4 trillion in total assets under professional management. The bulk of this, $US1.5 trillion in assets, is invested in socially screened separate accounts managed for individual and institutional clients, including $US17.3 billion managed for individual clients and another $US1.49 trillion under management in institutional client accounts. SRI separate account assets have increased 10-fold from the $US150 billion identified in 1995.

Tim Smith, president of the Social Investment Forum and senior vice-president at Walden Asset Management, said, “Over the past decade, SRI has become a major force in the U.S. financial marketplace. Socially and environmentally screened mutual funds have experienced substantial growth in their number and diversity of products as well as the social issues they consider.”

“Mainstream money managers are increasingly incorporating social, environmental and governance factors into their investing,” he added. “A growing number of institutional investors are embracing the philosophy of active ownership with the companies in their portfolios. There has been real growth in the number of shareholder resolutions filed on social, environmental and corporate-governance issues and support for them rose dramatically over the last 10 years. And community investing is surging at a meteoric rate as an option for investors who want to see their assets make a direct and tangible difference in the U.S. and around the world.”