Speakers

Nick Abel is the investment director of the Sustainable Investment and Stewardship Strategies Portfolio at CalSTRS, the largest educator-only public pension fund in the world. Abel is a member of CalSTRS’ leadership team and is responsible for managing the SISS Portfolio and CalSTRS’ net zero implementation team, and oversees CalSTRS’ stewardship activities including corporate engagement, proxy voting and outreach with the fund’s stakeholders.

The SISS Portfolio serves as a source of long-term capital appreciation and opportunistically increases exposure to private climate solutions that are additive to the total fund and demonstrate positive contributions to a more sustainable global economy. The portfolio seeks to explore and incubate new sustainability-focused partnerships that take advantage of unique alpha opportunities that may not fit neatly in other private asset classes and leverage existing partnerships with CalSTRS private market asset classes to advance the goals of the Collaborative Model and the one-fund approach to increase sustainability-focused co-investment, joint venture and direct investment opportunities.

As of December 31, 2025, the portfolio had committed more than $5 billion in investments across private credit, private equity and infrastructure strategies.

Prior to CalSTRS, Abel held positions at private-sector firms such as Wespath Investment Management, RVK, Inc. and Saturna Capital, Inc. Abel grew up in Zimbabwe, Cambodia, Vietnam and China and earned his bachelor's degree in business administration with a concentration in finance from Western Washington University. He is an Institutional Limited Partners Association Advisory committee member and has served on multiple working groups and advisory committees, including Ceres, Principles for Responsible Investment, Global Impact Investor Network, Deep Transitions Futures and Sustainable Accounting Standards Board prior to its integration with International Financial Reporting Standards Foundation.