Carbon-credit users typically outperform non-users in disclosing and reducing their emissions, setting targets and investing in low-carbon technologies, while integrity in carbon markets is also improving — key takeaways from MSCI’s Climate Week NYC event.  

Location and granularity may be the new mantra in assessing climate-related physical risk, while private assets and AI have a growing role in the decarbonization — key takeaways from MSCI’s Climate Week NYC event on “Financial Frontiers: Climate Strategies and Transition Frameworks.”

Have users of carbon credits reduced emissions faster or slower than non-users? Our latest report contradicts the notion that companies have used carbon credits as an alternative to investing in climate mitigation activities within their businesses. 

Our panel discusses what’s happening in public equity markets, the importance of governance and of sustainable investing more broadly, as well as the growing world of private assets, including private credit and the ways in which these assets might come to resemble their public counterparts more than they do today.

MSCI’s Sustainability and Climate Trends to Watch 2024 explores key themes that could shape the world of ESG investing. Here we touch on three of them: extreme weather, the regulatory aspects of AI and investing in nature via the voluntary carbon market. 

The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences was awarded on Monday to Claudia Goldin, a Harvard professor, for her work to advance the world’s understanding of women in the work force. She made history by being the first woman to win the award solo rather than sharing in the prize. To honor her achievement, we discussed our own gender pay gap research that is in part informed by academics like Dr. Goldin, focusing on a new regulation in Japan that mandated companies disclose their pay gap data. And then, after we go through the numbers, we have a special part of this episode where colleagues come on to share their experiences of work before and after motherhood.

Antibiotic resistance is more worrisome than ever. It is possible that by 2050, three times as many people could die a year as died during the worst parts of the COVID-19 pandemic. But there may be hope in the development of novel antibiotics. We discuss how this is related to the development of the COVID-19 vaccine. Then we finally put ESG ratings in their rightful place and tell you what they are REALLY used for.

In June of 2017, the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosure (TCFD) released climate-related disclosure recommendations to companies and investors that included a framework for better company disclosure and a request for climate scenarios as part of that disclosure. But for investors looking to incorporate environmental risk into their process, there might be a pretty big catch: We mapped over 140 MSCI ESG Research climate-related data points to the TCFD framework and found a...

How can ESG characteristics be integrated consistently across factor-based and active equity allocations? In Part 4 of the Foundations of ESG Investing paper, we discuss two approaches to applying ESG ratings to factor-based allocations – a one-step and a two-step approach – asking which has done a better job at combining the underlying strategy with ESG while maintaining exposure to target factors. We then investigate overlaying ESG ratings and ESG momentum on the historical holdings of...

According to recent surveys, asset owners’ have shifted their main focus to ESG’s financial benefits, as opposed to social benefits. In the third part of this paper, we discuss how ESG can be integrated into indexed allocations using MSCI ESG Ratings, which provided better risk-adjusted returns from August 2010 to December 2017 than the MSCI ACWI Index. We used existing best-in-class selection-based index methodologies (the MSCI ESG Leaders Index) for the creation of hypothetical global and...

Many studies have focused on the relationship between companies with strong ESG characteristics and corporate financial performance.  However, these have often struggled to show that positive correlations — when produced — can in fact explain the behavior. This paper provides a  link between ESG information and the valuation and performance of companies, both through their systematic risk profile (lower costs of capital and higher valuations) and their idiosyncratic risk profile...

Many of the world’s largest institutional investors are integrating ESG standards into their investment strategies. But they face a challenge: Excluding every objectionable firm or selecting only ESG (environmental, social and governance) leaders can slash the number of acceptable stocks by half while foreclosing on opportunities for dialogue and engagement. How can institutions implement ESG principles without sacrificing diversification or abandoning efforts to improve corporate conduct?

HOW CAN UNIVERSAL OWNERS INTEGRATE ESG PRINCIPLES WHILE MAINTAINING A BROAD AND DIVERSIFIED INVESTMENT UNIVERSE? Institutional investors are increasingly looking for ways to integrate ESG considerations into their investment decisions. By doing so, they may aim to mitigate long-term risks, generate higher risk-adjusted performance and/or align investments with broader societal objectives. As ESG investment guidelines become more commonplace among asset owners, and as many continue to build...

As institutional equity investors increasingly think about the long term, they may adjust their portfolios to accommodate environmental, social and governance (ESG) concerns in their investment decision-making processes. That can be particularly challenging for the largest investors, such as pension funds and endowments, whose portfolios span the entire equity market.

Institutional investors increasingly are looking for ways to steer capital toward companies that help to address major social and environmental challenges.

Institutional investors are increasingly looking for ways to steer capital toward companies and projects that provide solutions to major social and environmental challenges, but achieving impact at scale can be a challenging proposition. The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provide a useful foundation for scalable impact, representing a broad consensus of global stakeholders around 17 ambitious development goals. The new Sustainable Impact framework and accompanying data...

To solve for the next generation of investors’ demands for greater transparency around the ESG characteristics of their investments, MSCI ESG Research is introducing the concept of ESG Quality with the calculation of a Fund ESG Quality Score across over 21,000 mutual funds and ETFs. Funds with higher scores are comprised of companies managing their ESG risks relative to industry peers.

To solve for the next generation of investors’ demands for greater transparency around the ESG characteristics of their investments, MSCI ESG Research is introducing the concept of ESG Quality with the calculation of a Fund ESG Quality Score across over 21,000 mutual funds and ETFs. Funds with higher scores are comprised of companies managing their ESG risks relative to industry peers.

In our annual trends report, we highlight the key environmental, social and governance (ESG) trends that are top of mind for investors going into the New Year. In 2016, these trends reflect a softening economy, a long-term shift to a low carbon economy, a generational changeover and institutional forces.   Download the Research Spotlight "2016 ESG Trends to Watch." To read data from other years, please see our ESG Trends page.

The climate deal struck in Paris set an ambitious goal of limiting the temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius, with a stretch goal of 1.5 degrees. While the key elements of legally binding country emission reduction targets appeared to be missing, countries agreed to submit five-year updates to their emissions reduction pledges and to establish a framework for monitoring, measuring and verifying emissions reductions.

Assessing the carbon footprint of a portfolio is the first step in addressing the investment implications of climate change. Carbon footprinting sets a baseline to inform future actions, which can range from reporting and engagement to decarbonization and integrated risk management.

We head into the new year with the backdrop of swooning oil prices and (re)newed geopolitical fault‐lines, juxtaposed against a return to growth in the US and emergence of the next generation of tech darlings.