The Conscious Advertising Network (CAN) has denied accusations of being linked to Russian firms following an investigation by a conservative leaning news outlet.
The investigation alleges that the parent company of one of CAN’s major backers, Quadrature Climate Foundation (QCF), holds a significant amount of shares in firms owned by a sanctioned Russian oligarch, as well as controversial South American mining operations.
The development comes just days after the organisation spoke out to clarify it had no ongoing links with pressure group Stop Funding Hate, which has previously organised boycotts of media outlets like the Sun, the Daily Mail, the Daily Express, and GB News.
CAN, a coalition of over 180 advertisers, agencies, tech providers and civil society groups that espouses an ethical approach to advertising, has now come under renewed pressure following questions over its links to QCF, whose parent firm Quadrature Capital also has stakes of up to £135 million in the fossil fuel industry.
Publishing the findings of its investigation, GB News has claimed that Quadrature Capital holds significant shares in a company linked to a close ally of Vladimir Putin, as well as in Latin American mining operations that have been accused of being involved in human rights abuses concerning the local indigenous populations.
However, responding to Quadrature Capital’s alleged investment in these firms and the fossil fuel industry, CAN co-chairs Jake Dubbins and Harriet Kingaby told Marketing Beat: “For clarity, our relationship is with Quadrature Climate Foundation, not Quadrature Capital. We have never spoken to or dealt with anyone at Quadrature Capital.”
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“Quadrature Climate Foundation is a UK charity and we have found no evidence that the charity is linked to fossil fuels or human rights abuses,” they continued.
“We’re reviewing our due diligence processes and talking with our funders, but our understanding is that QCL’s investment strategy is fully transparent and based on algorithmic trading. Stocks are not held or actively picked.”
Quadrature currently holds 17,304 shares in Ozon Holdings, a firm owned by sanctioned oligarch Alexander Alexandrovich Shulgin, with a total value of over US$100,000. Shulgin is known to be a prominent backer of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Moreover, Quadrature’s shares of over $3 million in the Pan American Silver Corporation will prove concerning for CAN, given the various different human rights concerns that have been aired against the business.
Activists across several countries have campaigned tirelessly against the Pan American Silver Corporation, which has been accused of militarising already sensitive areas, causing high levels of metal contamination across many communities and even forcibly dispossessing people of their land in order to expand its mining operations.
