ESG investing

[donkpow]

It's a thing. Basically you invest in companies or whatever based on factors other than financial information. This would be like wind farms to help reduce carbon production, companies who make minority hiring a priority, etc. I have one, Danimer Scientific., Inc. "It s a performance polymer company specializing in developing and producing bioplastic replacements for petrochemical-based plastics."

So that's basically a pure ESG trade for me, my only one. The other way I prefer to do things is to give consideration for a how a company fits into a changing world. For example, my GLDD (I've mentioned this one a couple of times) stock is a company that is also providing support for offshore wind farm construction. It's a factor. If profits go down, I'm likely to hold the company a little longer than usual.

You should invest in these two companies and help to make me wealthy. It's the responsible thing to do. 

[Razors Edge ★]

11 minutes ago, donkpow said:

You should invest in these two companies and help to make me wealthy. It's the responsible thing to do.

You're already wealthy in so many other ways, Don!  Why let money spoil it?

[donkpow]

3 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

You're already wealthy in so many other ways, Don!  Why let money spoil it?

It's like fertilizer. Yeah it stinks but it makes produce sweeter.

[jsharr ★]

Just now, donkpow said:

It's like fertilizer. Yeah it stinks but it makes produce sweeter.

No it doesn't.  Sunlight makes produce sweeter.  You have heard of a little thing called photosynthesis, no?

[donkpow]

Just now, jsharr said:

No it doesn't.  Sunlight makes produce sweeter.  You have heard of a little thing called photosynthesis, no?

Shut your filthy mouth. We're talking money here, not hippy stuff.

[jsharr ★]

8 minutes ago, donkpow said:

You shut your dirty whore mouth. We're talking money here, not hippy stuff.

fify

[MoseySusan]

48 minutes ago, donkpow said:

You should invest in these two companies and help to make me wealthy

My portfolios are stuffed with polluters, wasters, and exploiters. You know…making money the honest way.

[Razors Edge ★]

Just now, MoseySusan said:

My portfolios are stuffed with polluters, wasters, and exploiters. You know…making money the honest way.

Well, certainly the "easier" way!  I think of it as "paying it forward".  Let those folks deal with our mess, and leave me to enjoy what's left of paradise.

[MoseySusan]

13 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

Well, certainly the "easier" way!  I think of it as "paying it forward".  Let those folks deal with our mess, and leave me to enjoy what's left of paradise.

That candy you crave is to ease the bitterness in your heart. 

[Parsnip Totin Jack ★]

[Razors Edge ★]

Just now, MoseySusan said:

That candy you crave is to ease the bitterness in your heart. 

So true!  Just had some M&Ms, bite size Snickers, and little Krackle bars!  Bitterness eased - for now!

I do wonder if folks in 100 years will know what real chocolate tastes like. Or coffee. Or a number of things.  I gotta assume some will, but what are the odds many kids we know will be 1%ers?

[MoseySusan]

Just now, Old No. 7 said:

We need to get to safe bike lane infrastructure, first. Then we can start repurposing wind turbine blades. 

[MoseySusan]

1 minute ago, Razors Edge said:

I do wonder if folks in 100 years will know what real chocolate tastes like.

Do we know? From what I’ve read, chocolate was originally consumed as a liquid, not a solid. Who can say what “real” chocolate is…maybe people will eventually shift to eating coffee beans instead of drinking an extraction. 

[Razors Edge ★]

10 minutes ago, MoseySusan said:

Do we know? From what I’ve read, chocolate was originally consumed as a liquid, not a solid. Who can say what “real” chocolate is…maybe people will eventually shift to eating coffee beans instead of drinking an extraction. 

Good luck growing the coffee and cacao beans.  That's the issue, not the method of preparation.  Shift the climate, but not the trees, farms, and workers, and the 100+ years we have put into optimizing the growing & harvesting process loses much of its value.

[MoseySusan]

3 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

Shift the climate, but not the trees, farms, and workers, and the 100+ years we have put into optimizing the growing & harvesting process loses much of its value.

I suspect the farms will move where the climate shifts. I know plenty of 12 year olds in the Midwest who would rather pick cacao for six hours than go to school. 

[Kirby]

I tend to invest in broad based indexes, so I get some good along with the bad.   But some  ESG investing is based on the theory that socially responsible companies are likely to do better in the long run, so it can still be financially motivated,   Although this Bloomberg article mentions that many ESG funds significantly overlap the holdings of an S&P 500 fund, but with higher fees.

[Razors Edge ★]

2 minutes ago, MoseySusan said:

I suspect the farms will move where the climate shifts.

Think they'll shift with the water tables, the population centers, and the highways?  Many folks tend to hold on to their land, homes, and hopes with the belief that it might get better.  You can lose a lot of time waiting to figure out when and where you ought to invest your time and energy creating a new coffee or cocoa farm, and perhaps even in competition with a corn or banana farm??? 

I think there are always ways we can adapt - tweak the DNA of beans to like their new climes or be proactive in developing the likely future optimal locations - but balance that against other needs going on in the same timeframe, and it becomes a bigger hurdle. 

[donkpow]

1 minute ago, Kirby said:

I tend to invest in broad based indexes, so I get some good along with the bad.   But some  ESG investing is based on the theory that socially responsible companies are likely to do better in the long run, so it can still be financially motivated,   Although this Bloomberg article mentions that many ESG funds significantly overlap the holdings of an S&P 500 fund, but with higher fees.

Probably an exploitation of a popular notion. There are ESG ETF's. Choose wisely.

[Razors Edge ★]

5 minutes ago, donkpow said:

Probably an exploitation of a popular notion. There are ESG ETF's. Choose wisely.

It would seem a periodic check of "ESG approved" companies could be done, and then a simple index fund build around them would be sufficient.  Not sure where the extra fees would come in unless you wanted a really intensive review of each and every stock's ESG qualifications with regular overview.  IOW, find the group(s) that work for each ESG approach, kick it into automatic (low cost) mode, and revisit annually or quarterly or whatever to make sure they're still on the right path you want.

There has to be non-profit groups regularly publishing stuff like that as well, so a simple cross reference to a trusted source would tick most boxes with minimal overhead by a firm.  If the analysis is an intensive review of tiny companies and trying to determine their viability long term, that obviously gets harder.  But that Bloomberg comment seems to suggest many are already large enough to be on the S&P 500, so how much extra research is truly involved?

[12string]

I did finally move out of all my petroleum stocks.  The world needs to stop burning fossil fuels.  The world knows it, these companies will stop making money, why should I own their stock.  I mean, I just did the altruistic thing.

I did invest in 5G, that causes COVID, but if people have to die for my portfolio, at least it was a good cause

[Wilbur ★]

Most companies move out of dying industries and in to others so they become the large players of new technologies.  Fossil fuels will be used extensively for far beyond anyone here. They will be used smarter and cleaner but there is nothing to replace them that also doesn't consume them. 

[donkpow]

I've owned two ETF's. The first was a Blackrock corporate paper thing and, more recently, an internet security fund. I sold out of the Blackrock fund at a profit with the COVID crash. Everything was just too unpredictable to hold corporate paper at the time. The security ETF that I recently acquired is just a way to get into the space. I couldn't find a place to enter so I just hired somebody to do it for me.  Returns will probably be low but steady and of course there will be fees. (The bastards.)

I own two petroleum related stocks. Kinder Morgan and Williams Companies. Mostly for natural gas transport services. NEP is a player and is acquiring in the space but is also involved in alternate energy sources.

Fossil fuels will be in place a long time. When there is a need for energy, fossil fuels will be in storage ready to go. Just look at what is happening to coal right now. And KSA is nearly fully funded by oil in the ground. We still need to move forward. Better to let it evolve than force a reversal.