The financial market risk of climate change

We’ve mentioned it before – people are getting together with lawyers to focus on polluters in the same way cigarette makers were targeted. On the same day that US rates were lowered investors and NGOs petitioned the SEC to clarify whether firms had an obligation to disclose how climate change might affect them.  It is …
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5th Global Corporate Climate Change Report issued by CDP

The Carbon Disclosure Project released its fifth Global Corporate Climate Change Report, tracking carbon disclosure and attitudes toward climate change in the world’s largest companies. The CDP this year also launched the Climate Disclosure Leadership Index, an honor roll for companies who are best addressing climate change issues. The launch coincided with the U.N. summit …
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Norway’s high standard of sovereign fund management

The FT describes how Norway’s sovereign fund management sets the standard. Government Pension Fund-Global, part of Norges Bank, was set up by the Norwegian government in 1990 and manages about €235 billion. It has worked with authorities in Kazakhstan, East Timor, Bolivia, the Faroe Islands and several African countries among others. “We make no strategic …
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Excessive pay hurts economy and society

A new report claims that excessive executive compensation in the US is taking a staggering economic and social toll on American society, threatening leadership in the business, government, and nonprofit sectors and creating instability in the economy. The report gives a good summary of the gross disparity between top earners and average earners and disparages …
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SRI reduced sub-prime exposure

An interesting review of the run-up to the sub-prime mortgage meltdown shows that SR investors started considering the implications of sub-prime business exposure back in 1999 and a number of institutional SR investors adjusted portfolio exposure accordingly.  It shows that investors who take a broader view of business (social and environment as well as economic) …
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CSR is growing up

The recent launch of Supercapitalism by Robert Reich which criticises CSR has stimulated debate about its role in private enterprise.  You can see The Economist’s take here and an interview with the author by BusinessWeek here. It is naive, even primitive, to argue that corporations have no ethical dimension, rather it is increasingly their role …
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CSR increases profitability

According to a survey of more than 500 business executives by Grant Thornton, executives believe that corporate responsibility programs can positively impact their business and help achieve strategic goals. While commentary by traditionalists might suggest that CSR will be a cost, without benefit, only a quarter of survey respondents agreed that profits need be sacrificed, …
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Integrity for success

I came across a recent compilation of presentations from various events entitled Integrity: A Positive Model that Incorporates the Normative Phenomena of Morality, Ethics, and Legality (page down to find link to full study). The authors present a positive model of integrity that provides powerful access to increased performance for individuals, groups, organizations, and societies. …
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