(UN Environment Programme, Finance Initiative) This week the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) launched the second part of its 6th Assessment Report, drawing on seven years of research from peer-reviewed scientists. The report provides an alarming summary of the increasingly devastating impacts of climate change on societies and economies, their vulnerabilities and how we…

(Forbes) If anything, for a large portion of the institutional investor community this high price market for oil and gas might represent an opportunity to accelerate getting out of the sector rather than jumping back in. I know several endowment managers, for example, who have been slowly transitioning out of fossil fuel holdings rather than…

(The Hill) A bipartisan coalition of attorneys general are investigating TikTok’s impact on the well-being of children, the group announced Wednesday.  The attorneys general will investigate if the popular video sharing app violated state consumer protection laws and put the public at risk.  This follows an investigation launched by the same group of attorneys general in November…

(Quartz) The impacts of climate change are here today, are worse than scientists expected, and no government or company is doing enough to adapt to them. That’s according to a new report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), released today (Feb. 28). In some cases, the report warns, policies and infrastructure intended to mitigate these…

(The Wall Street Journal) U.S. tech giants are under pressure from both Russia and the West to respond to the conflict in Ukraine, highlighting their power over global discourse but also escalating a recent trend in which their businesses are squeezed by geopolitical events. Analysts say the conflict could accelerate the fracturing of the internet,…

(LinkedIn) This movement became more mainstream just under ten years ago. At this time, the entry of several large players gave the socially conscious business and investment movement the tailwind it lacked. Players like Bain Capital and then TPG Capital launched impact-focused funds. Larry Fink, CEO of Blackrock, issued his first statement on stakeholder capitalism,…

(Financial Times) Environmental, social and governance investing has been a source of huge growth for the asset management industry in recent years. It could soon become a source of big problems. Industry insiders are starting to worry that some of the overly optimistic or misleading ESG claims that have been made in fund documents and…

(HBR) CEOs and boards of directors are under increasing pressure to address environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues. To support them, companies like C.H. Robinson, Royal Caribbean, and Verizon have recently appointed chief ESG officers. To discover whether your company would benefit from having one, the authors suggest considering three questions: Do your stakeholders care…

(Institutional Investor) Greenwashing is often in the eye of the beholder, depending largely on one’s sustainable investing philosophy, according to PitchBook analyst Anikka Villegas. In an analyst note published Monday, Villegas wrote that the growth in environmental, social, and governance investing has come with confusion and disagreement about the definitions of terms like ESG, sustainable…

(Morningstar) Long-term shareholders of Tesla (TSLA) are preparing to push the company on race issues after California sued the electric car maker for alleged racial discrimination and harassment. The complaint filed by the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing earlier this month followed claims from hundreds of workers that they were the targets of…