Ramaswamy takes on Apple, Disney with new index fund to push 'excellence over politics' in boardrooms

Strive founder and executive chairman Vivek Ramaswamy announced his new Strive 500 ETF on "Varney & Co." Tuesday, designed to drive "cultural change in the boardroom" by maximizing value over political agendas and focusing "exclusively on merit."

VIVEK RAMASWAMY: A lot of what's happened in the last few years is shareholders like BlackRock, State Street and Vanguard have foisted anti-American policies on American companies. One example was Apple which adopted a racial equity audit after shareholders pressured the company to do so, including BlackRock who voted in favor of a racial equity audit. My view is companies like Apple shouldn’t focus on racial equity audits, they should focus on hiring people exclusively based on merit without regard to race, sex or politics. 

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So the point this new fund that we launched today, STRV is the ticker, it's the Strive 500, is to deliver that voice to corporate America, to corporate America’s boardrooms, to tell them to focus exclusively on excellence over politics, and yes, when it comes to hiring go back to focusing exclusively on merit. I am proud to say that was the subject of my shareholder letter to Apple’s board of directors and there is a separate letter to Disney’s board. I hope [this] is the beginning of a broader conversation both in capital markets and in the boardroom.

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