Posts by lucidcapitalism

(Financial Times) Venture capital money is flooding back into clean tech companies a decade after the “mini green bubble” saw private financing for the sector dry up. But John Thornhill argues that the climate tech 2.0 investment boom has better promise than version 1.0. Between 2006 and 2011, VCs spent more than $25bn funding clean…

(Techcrunch) With the increase in attention on environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues over the past few years, it’s easy for companies to assume that we’ve reached the crest of the ESG wave. However, we are only at the early stages — an ESG tsunami is headed toward Silicon Valley. The increased attention on ESG…

(Protocol) Twitter is publicly sharing research findings today that show that the platform’s algorithms amplify tweets from right-wing politicians and content from right-leaning news outlets more than people and content from the political left. The research did not identify whether or not the algorithms that run Twitter’s Home feed are actually biased toward conservative political…

(Reuters) The U.S. Federal Reserve on Thursday banned individual stock purchases by top officials at the central bank and unveiled a broad set of other restrictions on their investing activities roughly six weeks after reports of active trading by some senior policymakers triggered an ethics uproar. The new rules will limit the types of financial…

(New York Times) Consumers and investors alike have gobbled up Beyond Meat’s burgers, sausage and chicken in recent years, thanks at least in part to the company’s message that its plant-based products are good for the environment. But some aren’t so sure. One investor tracking firm gives Beyond Meat a zero when it comes to…

(Responsible Investor) The US Department of Labor (DoL) had today put forward a proposed rule that would remove Trump-era obstacles preventing US workplace pension schemes from considering ESG when investing, including using ESG funds for their default strategies. Read more here.

(Vice) Starbucks has temporarily closed two stores involved in a union drive in Buffalo, New York, that are leading what could soon become the first campaign to successfully unionize the coffee shop giant. The company said that the two temporary store closures in Buffalo have nothing to do with the union drive—one is for a remodel…

(New York Times) As the oil and gas industry faces upheaval amid global price gyrations and catastrophic climate change, private equity firms — a class of investors with a hyper focus on maximizing profits — have stepped into the fray. Read more here.

(World Economic Forum) Mental illnesses, such as depressive and anxiety disorders, are among the 25 leading drivers of global burden of diseases. More broadly, mental health includes mental wellness, emotional resilience and psychosocial wellbeing – all of which are impacted by climate change, particularly among vulnerable communities in natural-disaster prone environments, and in low- and…

(WSJ) The Ford Foundation, S&P Global, Hamilton Lane and Omidyar Network are backing the venture to gather and share data related to environmental, social and governance performance. The system, called Novata, aims to be a central database for gathering, reporting and benchmarking companies’ performance on factors such as carbon emissions, resource management, employee diversity and…