Sustainable Investing

1.5 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

This course is geared towards students in business school and also programs geared towards environment and sustainability management. We will examine issues related to Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) investing. Topics covered include: • ESG Performance – What has been the historical risk and return of incorporating ESG factors? Are there costs to ESG investing? • ESG Ratings – Who are the different raters? How are ratings estimated? What do the ratings measure? What are the similarities and differences between the ratings? • Investors – Why have investors become interested in ESG? How do institutional investors consider the tradeoff between fiduciary responsibility, performance, and other factors? • ESG Factors – How are ESG factors incorporated in investment and portfolio decisions? How do they impact performance? What is the role of active managers versus passive indexing? • Companies – How are companies responding and incorporating ESG? • Do investors vote with their feet (portfolio composition) and/or vote with their voice (proxy voting and engagement)? • Policy and Regulatory Issues – Is ESG disclosure by companies needed? If yes, what form should it take?