UNITED STATES
SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20549
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SCHEDULE 14A
Proxy Statement Pursuant to Section 14(a) of
the Securities Exchange Act of 1934
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The Travelers Companies, Inc.
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May 16, 2022
RE: The Travelers
Companies, Inc. (“Travelers” or the “Company”)
2022 Annual Meeting of Shareholders – May 25, 2022
Dear Fellow Shareholders:
We are writing to ask for your support by voting in accordance with
the recommendations of our Board of Directors on all of the
proposals included in our Proxy Statement, which was filed on April
8, 2022 and is available at
https://investor.travelers.com/home/default.aspx and on the
SEC website.
The Board has recommended a vote against each of the shareholder
proposals. We would like to reiterate some important information
about why the Board has recommended a vote “AGAINST” two of the
proposals in particular:
•Item
5 – Shareholder Proposal Relating to GHG Emissions;
and
•Item
7 – Shareholder Proposal Relating to a Racial Equity
Audit.
We encourage you to review our Proxy Statement for a more fulsome
explanation of the Board’s recommendations and supplement those
disclosures below.
GHG Emissions Proposal
While Travelers is proud to advance a comprehensive climate
strategy, which we discuss in further detail on our sustainability
website and in our TCFD Report, the Board has recommended a vote
against the shareholder proposal relating to GHG emissions for two
simple reasons:
1.The
Company’s Robust Climate Reporting Directly Addresses the
Proposal’s Request in its Entirety.
The proponents are requesting the publication of a report
“addressing
if and how
[the Company] intends to measure, disclose, and reduce the GHG
emissions associated with its underwriting, insuring, and
investment activities . . .” (emphasis added).
Among its other disclosures, the Company’s existing comprehensive
report, published pursuant to the recommendations of the Task Force
on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (“TCFD”), includes clear
disclosure directly responsive to the proponent’s
request.
With respect to the Company’s underwriting/insurance activities,
the Company’s TCFD Report provides the following discussion
regarding its decision not to measure, disclose, and reduce the GHG
emissions associated with those activities:
“. . . GHG emissions data for the vast majority of our underwriting
portfolio (e.g., personal automobile, homeowners, small and
mid-sized businesses) is not readily available and, where it is
available, the
data quality remains uneven.
Accordingly,
at this time, we cannot accurately calculate the total emissions of
our customers and are therefore unable to disclose the emissions,
or establish any emissions reduction targets, with respect to our
underwriting portfolio.”
(TCFD Report p. 9; emphasis added)
Similarly, with respect to investment activities, Travelers’ TCFD
Report states:
“GHG emissions data for the substantial majority of segments of our
investment portfolio (e.g., municipal bonds, structured bonds,
private equity funds) is not readily available and, where it is
available, the data quality remains uneven. Accordingly,
at this time, we cannot accurately calculate the total emissions of
our investment portfolio and are therefore unable to disclose the
emissions, or establish any emissions reduction targets, with
respect to our portfolio.”
(TCFD Report p. 13; emphasis added)
Thus, the Company has fully addressed the proposal’s
request.
2.The
GHG Emissions Data Associated with the Company’s Underwriting and
Investment Portfolios is Largely Unavailable and, Where it is
Available, the Data is Unreliable
The resolution of the proposal requests disclosure regarding “if
and how” Travelers “intends to measure, disclose, and reduce the
GHG emissions associated with its underwriting, insuring, and
investment activities . . .” As explained above, the Company has
fully implemented that request. To the extent that, despite the
proposal’s plain meaning, the proposal is interpreted as requesting
that Travelers affirmatively measure, disclose and reduce the GHG
emissions associated with its underwriting and investment
activities, the Company does not currently have the ability to do
so for reasons beyond its control. As stated above and in the
Company’s publicly available TCFD Report, the GHG emissions data
for the vast majority of the Company’s underwriting portfolio
(e.g., personal automobile, homeowners, small and mid-sized
businesses) and for the substantial majority of segments of the
Company’s investment portfolio (e.g., municipal bonds, structured
bonds, private equity funds) is not readily available and, where it
is available, the data quality remains uneven. This is not a matter
of Travelers having “slightly less than perfect data,” as
euphemistically suggested by the proponent, but about
overwhelmingly absent and unreliable data. As explained in the
Company’s TCFD Report, Travelers is, very simply, unable to
accurately calculate the total emissions of either its underwriting
or investment portfolio or to disclose or establish any emissions
reduction targets with respect to such portfolios.
Travelers acknowledges that other property casualty insurance
companies have made net zero or other environmental commitments
with respect to their portfolios. We believe that such goals are
aspirational in nature and are not a reflection of the current
availability or reliability of GHG emissions data, nor do they
imply the existence of well-established methodologies to estimate
such data. Travelers believes that, in light of the realities of
the current GHG emissions data landscape, it is imprudent – and not
in the best interest of shareholders – for the Company to commit to
measuring, disclosing or reducing the emissions associated with its
underwriting and investment portfolios.
Racial Equity Audit Proposal
Travelers is a proud and longstanding supporter of racial justice,
both within our company and within the communities in which we live
and work. Nonetheless, as it relates to the proposal’s request,
Travelers’ participation in a heavily regulated industry
meaningfully constrains its behaviors in ways that do not apply to
other companies that have considered similar proposals and/or that
have committed to undertake racial equity audits relating to their
business practices. While this proposal is well-intentioned and
originates from a noble aspiration, in Travelers’ case, its
implementation would cause the Company to violate state laws that
preclude insurers from taking race into account in their
underwriting and pricing decisions. In this vein, the Company notes
the following:
•The
proposal’s sweeping and general resolution requests an audit
relating to the purported “racial impacts of [the Company’s]
policies, practices, products, and services.” This language clearly
includes the Company’s underwriting and pricing practices, and the
proposal’s supporting statement further elucidates that the
proposal’s focus is on the Company’s underwriting and pricing
practices.
•The
language of the proposal does not merely request an audit to
assess, but also to produce “recommendations
for improving the racial impacts
of [the Company’s] policies, practices, products and services.”
Likewise, the supporting statement calls for corporations such as
Travelers to “recognize and
remedy
industry- and company-specific barriers to everyone’s full
inclusion in societal and economic participation.”
•The
suggestion that Travelers should take steps to alter its
underwriting criteria and/or pricing to achieve different outcomes
when measured on the basis of race, however, is unlawful under the
insurance laws of nearly every state in which the Company operates.
In one form or another, state laws prohibit insurers from
distinguishing among “individuals or risks of the same class or of
essentially the same hazard and expense element because of the
race, color, religion, or national origin of such insurance risks
or applicants” (Illinois statute quoted as but one example of such
state laws). In fact, the Company does not even
collect
information regarding the race of its customers for use in its
underwriting and/or pricing decisions.
•There
is no safe harbor or other exception that would authorize an
insurer to take race into account in order to achieve different
outcomes on the basis of race. It is the consideration of race
itself that is unlawful regardless of otherwise worthy
motives.
•In
this regard, any reference to racial equity audits being conducted
by other financial institutions is inapposite, both in light of the
unique regulatory environment in which insurers operate, discussed
briefly herein and in more detail in the Company’s proxy statement,
as well as the more limited scope of those audits as compared to
the audit requested in the current proposal’s
resolution.
We appreciate your time and consideration on these matters and ask
for your support of all of the Board’s recommendations. Our
Proxy Statement, this supplemental proxy material and our 2021
Annual Report are available
at https://investor.travelers.com/home/default.aspx.
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