OSLO, Dec 14 — Norway’s US$1.4 trillion (RM5.9 trillion) sovereign wealth fund, the world’s largest, has conducted a risk-based screening of 442 companies this year, concluding that it would refrain from investing in nine of those firms, it said today.

"Our pre-screening builds on and strengthens our long-standing work with risk-based divestments. It’s about weeding out companies that we do not want to be invested in,” said Nicolai Tangen, the CEO of Norges Bank Investment Management.

The fund said it would not name the affected companies.

The Norwegian fund invests in some 9,100 companies worldwide. It uses the FTSE Global All Cap index from FTSE Russell as the basis for its own reference index.

As new stocks are included in the FTSE index, the fund can screen out companies it does not want in its own portfolio based on environmental, social and governance (ESG) risks.

"During the second half of the year, we have also identified an additional 65 companies with high sustainability risk that we will consider following up through our investment processes and in our ownership work,” the fund said. — Reuters