SRI / ESG Mutual Fund Ratings

Things Everyone Should Know About Mutual Fund SRI/ESG Rating

Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG) and Socially Responsible Investing (SRI) Ratings, reporting, and data sets are increasingly available and used to help investors understand how different investment compare with respect to ESG/SRI issues.

Growing client interest in SRI/ESG has to an increase in new market entrants, and potential
confusion. Ratings providers have stepped in to help streamline the process. But all may not be as simple as it seems. Come learn what everyone should know when engaging these important tools.

Speakers: Kumesh Aroomoogan,, Hendrik Bartel, Amisha Parekh, Ben Webster, Mark Regier, Benjamin Bailey

NOTES

• ESG/SRI ratings are not perfect – for mutual funds not that useful
• Give a rating for their industry, do not judge industries – can be rated high for ESG/SRI and have lots of fossil fuel, military, and global bank companies
• Fossil fuel can have high ESG rating
• Military companies can have high ESG scores
• Sustainalitics rates for Morningstar – MSCI Rates Funds – CSR Hub
• Ratings from different companies don’t always match – if possible, it is best to use an average from serveral sources
• The ratings have a bias towards larger companies and towards global companies
• Avoidance does not equal impact – engagement needed for change
• Ratings don’t assess potential for real change
• The current rating systems are a start – they are good to have – but they are only a start

Investing for a Better World: From Vision to Impact to Disruption

The sustainable, responsible, impact investment industry is growing fast. ESG and SRI being considered is one step by how are we with impacting companies and the global economy? What can the SRI community do?

Speakers: Alice Tepper Marlin

NOTES

• 1 in 5 ($8 trillion) use some ESG factor in decision making
• Disrupting companies should be the goal. For example with Amazon – #4 company by size with a low ESG rating – low rating partially because of poor transparency. One strategy could be to push for electric fleet, recyclable packaging, worker minimum salaries, etc
• CSRHub rating – https://www.csrhub.com/ – CSRHub is the world’s largest sustainability business intelligence database. Our ratings and tools help professionals benchmark, evaluate, and improve company sustainability performance.
• Challenge is to make changes

Beware the Major Carbon Polluters! Science for a Healthy Planet and a Safer World

The scientific journal Climatic Change calculated the climate changes impact of specific oil, gas, and coal companies, including ExxonMobil and Chevron. Emissions from the top 90 fossil fuel producers and cement manufacturers account for nearly half of the global temperature increase and 30% of sea level rise.

Speakers: Brenda Ekwurzel – union of concerned scientiest

NOTES

• Coal, Oil, Gas and Cement
• 2/3 of emissions can be traced to just 90 companies – carbon producers
• 60% of emissions since 1980
• Oil companies knew about damage of emissions since before 1980 – did not take steps to reduce impact on climate change
• Climate accountability scorecard to evaluate risk in companies
• The rise in global atmospheric CO2, surface temperature, and sea level from emissions traced to major carbon producers – https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-017-1978-0
• Responsible for what? Carbon producer CO2 contributions and the energy transition – https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-017-2042-9
• Plus combustion
• A small number of companies are doing a large percentage of damage, including: Chevron, ExxonMoble, …