Finance & Investment
The latest in the spheres of socially responsible investing, impact investing, and other ways investors and shareholders are asserting their desire for ethical investment options.
From Alternative to Mainstream: An Honest Look at Doing Good Business
For many, the sustainable choice is the alternative choice: alternative lightbulbs, alternative cars, alternative shopping bags, alternative business models. But there’s no longer a need for the sustainability community to present itself this way — especially in relation to business. Every day, businesses face new and emerging risks related to environmental, social and governance (ESG)-related issues. In a world more connected than ever, these risks can be felt more directly and more immediately than they used to be.
“The Corporate Reporting Dialogue Is Looking for Alignment, Not for One Common Framework”
Sustainable Brands recently talked to Wim Bartels, Program Lead at the Corporate Reporting Dialogue (CRD) about key issues and initiatives around the further development of corporate reporting.
Move Over, Sustainability Accounting: Here Comes Purpose Accounting
Everyone’s heard of financial performance, asset performance and sustainability performance. Now comes purpose performance, a new measure of organizational performance.
New Methodologies Help Banking Industry Assess Risks, Opportunities of Climate Change
On Wednesday, 16 banks, the UN Environment Finance Initiative (UNEP FI) and climate risk advisory firm Acclimatise published new methodologies that will help banks understand how the physical risks and opportunities of a changing climate might affect their loan portfolios. The methodologies are designed to enable banks to be more transparent about their exposure to climate-related risks and opportunities, in line with the recommendations of the Financial Stability Board's (FSB) Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD).
Circulate Capital Launches to Invest in Solutions to Ocean Plastic Crisis
Circulate Capital, a new impact-focused investment management company, launched today in partnership with Closed Loop Partners, a firm that invests in companies, technology and recycling infrastructure to advance the circular economy; and Ocean Conservancy, a leading nonprofit environmental advocacy organization working to protect the world’s oceans.
New S&P Dow Jones Index Series First to Incorporate Future Carbon Price Risks
S&P Dow Jones Indices, the world’s leading index provider, today announced the launch of the S&P Carbon Price Risk Adjusted Index Series, which will measure the performance of companies in each respective underlying index with a weighting scheme based on estimated company market valuation at risk from predicted 2030 carbon prices.
400 Companies Poised to Advance SDGs, Generate Returns Make Up New Swell Investing Portfolio
Highlighting the importance of transparency in investing, impact investing platform Swell Investing has invited the public to vote on the final security in the Impact 400, a portfolio with the goal of offering investors 400 companies poised for impact and returns. Both Apple and Starbucks meet Swell's selective rules-based criteria, and the community will decide which will be included.
Trending: Goldman Sachs, CMS Energy, Danish Pension Funds Take on Sustainability-Linked Investments
Among the latest wins for ‘good finance,’ Goldman Sachs Asset Management (GSAM) launched an exchange-traded fund (ETF) tied to measurements of “just” business behavior; utility company CMS Energy has become the first U.S. company to enter a sustainability-linked loan; and six Danish pension funds partnered with the Danish State to establish a new DKK 4.1 billion Danish SDG Investment Fund.
PepsiCo Acquiring Bare Snacks to Add Fruit, Veggie Chips to Its Better-For-You Portfolio
Just days after sharing that it is partnering with a Chicago-based incubator to help scale food and beverage startups, PepsiCo has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Bare Foods Co, as Bare Snacks, the U.S.-based fruit and vegetable snack company has grown from farmers’ markets in Washington to a nationall
Trending: BofA, Lloyds, CBL Foster Clean Investments with Bond, Lending, Emissions Credits
Projects that reduce emissions, generate clean energy or aid sustainable development could benefit from more financial support this year thanks to recent announcements from financial firms in the United States, United Kingdom and Australia. From Bank of America (BofA) issuing its fourth and largest green bond to date, to Lloyds Banking Group’s new £2 billion scheme to offer discounted financing and a partnership that will see more emissions reduction credits listed on CBL Markets (CBL)’s global exchange, it’s been a good month for green investments.
Will We Soon See a More Sustainable Financial System?
It's now nearly 10 years since news broke of the Lehman Brothers collapse, which served as a precursor for this century's biggest-ever financial crisis. Underpinned by reckless borrowing and the untold dangers of the sub-prime mortgage sector, the Great Recession brought the world to its knees and altered the global economic landscape forever. While the global economy has largely enjoyed sustained (if slightly sluggish) growth since this time, the goal of creating a truly transparent financial market has yet to be fully realised. We've seen some progress in this respect, of course, but there is still much work to be done if we're to ensure that we fully heed the lessons of the Great Recession.
How Blockchain Is Helping The Plastic Bank Create a Global Economy of 'Social Plastic'
As much hype as cryptocurrencies and digital tokens are getting these days, their real-world, practical uses remain few and far between. But one Vancouver-based organization, The Plastic Bank, is working to exchange plastic waste for digital currency in some of the world’s poorest places.
Even Though Bitcoin Wastes Power, Blockchain Can Be Sustainable
When you hear the word “cryptocurrency,” what’s the first thing that springs to mind? For many of us, it’s Bitcoin — the original, most highly valued, and most widely discussed cryptocurrency. And for many of us who care about conserving energy and innovating with sustainable solutions to climate change, Bitcoin isn’t exactly a household brand.
Startup Allows Neighbors to Generate Returns Through Investments in Their Community
“A lot of people want to participate in Detroit’s recovery, but unfortunately, they feel that because they’re not a billionaire, millionaire, celebrity or politician, they feel they can’t,” Kwaku Osei told Fast Company.
New Principles Aim to Drive Investment in Sustainable Fisheries
At the World Ocean Summit held last month in Mexico, the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and three impact funds – Meloy Fund, Encourage Capital and Althelia Ecosphere – announced the first-ever set of Principles for Investment in Sustainable Fisheries, aimed at bringing more money into an increasingly critical sector and growing global challenge.
$94B Needed to Realize RE100 Renewable Energy Targets by 2030
Bloomberg New Energy Finance has released a new report that reveals that signatories of the RE100 initiative have a long way to go to achieve their 100 percent renewable energy targets by 2030. For the initiative’s 128 members to meet their goal, they will need to spend an estimated $94 billion. According to Bloomberg, this is enough to procure 172 TWh of renewable power and add 87 gigawatts of new wind and solar power capacity.
UK Government Calls on Top Pension Funds to Disclose Climate Risks
The UK’s Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) is calling on top pension funds in the UK to disclose information on the risks that climate change poses to pension savings. The move was prompted by an admission from the Department for Work and Pensions that there is widespread misunderstanding amongst trustees on the scope of their fiduciary duty in relation to environmental risks.
400+ Resolutions Show Investors Stepping Up to Tackle ESG Issues
As You Sow, the Sustainable Investments Institute and Proxy Impact have published an updated Proxy Preview report for 2018. The report offers a comprehensive look at more than 400 shareholder resolutions filed on environmental, social and sustainable governance (ESG) issues.
Beyond Supply and Demand: The Dynamic Equilibrium Between Global Thresholds and Allocations
As a monetary adviser, I spent many years questioning bankers on the authenticity of their balances sheets. What stood out most for me in these discussions was this: the social demand for commodities is often claimed by banks as having a direct link with the ecological supply of resources which are extracted, produced and sold as commodities. But this just isn’t true. Bank reserve assets are not discounted to reflect the decline of the world’s non-renewable resources. In fact, as society’s ecological debt continues to mount, no one is actually keeping track.
Sustainable Funding for Private Green Businesses
Financing tends to be on the top of the list of hurdles for sustainable companies looking to scale. A business does not survive on a mission alone, and in order to generate profits and revenue, it needs capital to operate. But for sustainable enterprises setting out to meet the triple bottle line (“Planet, People, Profit”) while minimizing impacts, attracting and raising funding can be a particularly challenging task.
