Statman (2000) compared the
Domini Social Index (DSI) and the S&P index during the 1990-98 periods.
"I think the
Domini Social Index has been around for 15 years and the return of it and the S&P 500 is almost identical," Loving says.
The
Domini Social Index 400 was started in 1990, and it mirrors the S&P except that the stocks were passed through social screens.
Many of the largest socially responsible mutual funds, including a leading benchmark, the
Domini Social Index, have been laggards for years.
For mutual funds and exchange-traded funds, the most common benchmark or index is the
Domini Social Index, which is a product of KLD Research & Analytics, Inc.
QHSAS 18001, Dow Jones Sustainability Index and the
Domini Social Index 400.
These findings have been clearly borne out by the success of the
Domini Social Index (DSI), which is a screened, slightly trimmed-down cousin of the S&P 500 (a roster of 500 large companies that represents the stock market as a whole).
This is what became the
Domini Social Index, which the Domini Social Equity Fund replicates.
Wells Fargo is listed in the
Domini Social Index, a stock portfolio of socially responsible companies, along with AT&T, Reebok, Scholastic, Starbucks, and Sun Microsystems.
The Social Investment Forum reports that approximately $529 billion are now invested under some type of social screening.(8) Practitioners have been emboldened by strong recent performance: the
Domini Social Index (DSI), an index of 400 stocks passing typical social screens, has outperformed the Standard and Poor's 500 since its inception in May 1990, and virtually erased memories of the underperformance of South Africa-free portfolios in the late 1980s.
In his primary thrusts, Henwood assaults the
Domini Social Index for including some large corporations with questionable social or environmental records and complains that more SRI portfolios have a tobacco screen than a labor screen--concluding that the slogan "Do well by doing good" should be changed to "Do well by not doing such pure bad."
For example, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the investment firm Kinder, Lydenberg and Domini (KLD) has compiled the
Domini Social Index, a list of 400 socially screened corporations, which serves as a benchmark for the universe of stocks from which social investors might choose.