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Bringing Clarity to ESG Investing
Sticking to materiality and fundamental analysis are key
Environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) investing is often perceived as a “civil society movement,” disconnected from economic rationality. Guillaume Mascotto, Head of ESG at American Century Investments, acknowledges that the rise of ESG reflects a change in societal patterns (e.g. transnationalism, generational changes), but he defends the idea that ESG is also a reflection of currentand未来经济模式的变化——工业面临的物理和转型气候风险、技术进步等——投资者需要适应这些变化。
在某种程度上，由于ESG在投资领域的出现相对较晚，它仍然是一个易变的概念，缺乏统一、连贯的定义和坚实的分析和衡量基准。对这种情况的一种自然反应是转向所谓的“可伸缩”评估——评级、分数和其他beta类型的过滤器。然而，ESG领域中可用的大多数解决方案往往不会根据财务重要性和公司基本面进行背景分析。因此，过度依赖这类指导可能会限制投资者了解哪些ESG问题实际上在财务上是重要的，以及它们将在什么时间范围内影响公司的能力。换句话说，“ESG为什么以及如何移动针？马斯科特说。
An alternate response to unclear guidance is to double down on enthusiasm for assets that are strongly associated with positive societal and environmental impacts. Here too, what defines “impact” is not clear and can easily be misguided (or “washed”). For example, a power plant run on nuclear power is no doubt exposed to potential radioactive risks, but if it brings power to underserved communities or allows hospitals to run and continue saving lives, should the social impact necessarily be nullified? Similarly, aggressively harvesting trees can pose a risk to biodiversity, but reading school books printed onSFI或FSC-certified fiber has been shown to play a role in helping a儿童的学习和识字. Pulp manufacturing, while also derived from trees, is crucial to bringing hygiene products to the elderly and to remote communities in emerging markets. In these cases, could an overreliance on environmental impact theme come at the expense of the social impact theme?
最近几篇论文的作者，包括美国世纪的马斯科特,have emphasized that incorporating ESG factors into a portfolio should unfailingly focus on the investment process – in other words, it should be about investing first and foremost.
诚然，将ESG或影响因素纳入投资决策有助于实现一个总体愿景，即重视负责任的企业公民意识，而不是松懈或忽视的企业行为，但市场和股票估值属于一个高度波动的世界，超出了正负二元概念的范围。这正是ESG投资方法寻求实现equilibrium between ESG quality and expected returns comes into play. 最后，马斯科特说：“我们是一家主要的资产管理公司，我们有责任确保客户的长期经济和社会生存能力。”
ESG想谈谈，而且需要谈谈
Against this backdrop, American Century applies a holistic approach to ESG investing while remaining resolutely focused ondelivering solutions that meet its clients’ needs. 结合宏观和行业投入，重点关注发行人层面的财务重要性，American Century的ESG整合框架与公司的基础研究过程保持一致。与这一理念相一致的是，每当ESG考虑因素被应用于当前或潜在的投资组合增加时，American Century的ESG集团就“重新注入自下而上的基本面分析”的重要性提出了更广泛的要求。
Mascotto extrapolates from this to a general rule his group makes certain to follow. “We want the financial and ESG verticals of information to continually talk to each other,” he says. The idea is to ensure investment analysts are incentivized to participate in the ESG assessment by allowing them to provide input regarding the financial materiality of ESG issues to which their companies are or could be exposed.
打开“黑匣子”
公司对ESG问题的风险敞口是否转化为投资风险？如果是，转化的程度和方式如何？同样，如果一家公司的业务线或债务收益从环境影响的角度来看达到了目标，那么该公司的影响概况是否自然地与ESG风险评估的其他支柱保持一致？以这种方式提出这些问题有助于消除无意中的偏见，并使讨论回到对公司基本面和财务重要性的循证评估。在美国世纪，这是“打开黑匣子”运动开始发挥作用的时候。
在风险方面,而不是只关注我ssuer’s level of ESG disclosure or negative “externalities” (e.g. carbon emissions), American Century’s ESG team works with investment analysts to dive deeper into the issuer’s ability to manage any potential costs associated with exposure to ESG issues. For example, if the ESG issue to which a company is exposed could alter its growth trajectory over the medium to long term, the focus will be on the potential impact on earnings visibility through supply and demand assessments. Or, if the ESG exposure results in an immediate to short-term cost to the company’s market valuation or debt spreads, the focus is directed toward management’s remedial actions and whether any decrements to the company’s fundamental business profile could be warranted.
On the opportunity and impact side, new regulations or technological innovation can alter supply and demand fundamentals and, by extension, expose companies to potential risks, including loss of competitiveness or rising compliance or production costs. But these trends can also influence companies to react positively by innovating or repurposing assets toward business lines with either lower regulatory compliance risks or the potential for yielding positive social and environmental dividends.
马斯科特说：“我们的框架生成的ESG评估在时间上不是静态的。相反，为了评估马斯科特所说的“下行ESG风险倾向”，提升到投资组合经理的ESG观点是“基于风险和前瞻性的”and捕捉“ESG上行潜力”
Achieving ESG synthesis
奥地利经济学家约瑟夫•熊彼特（Joseph Schumpeter）在1950年写道：“要把握的要点是，在处理资本主义问题时，我们要处理的是一个进化过程。”。对这一说法的一种解释可能是，我们的经济体系，以及支持它的金融体系，正在不断地运转。因此，投资者必须能够不断调整自己的策略和经济前景，以适应这一演变过程，这是有道理的。毕竟，正如马斯科托所说，市场表现为一种“基于各种因素的打折工具”forward-lookingpointers and assumptions.”
Likewise, the investment community’s conceptual understanding of ESG, and its role in investment decision-making, is also continually unfolding. In Heideggerian terms, if the original thesis is that ESG issues fall outside of the investment scope, and the anti-thesis is that ESG reflects structural social changes which could have deep economic reverberations, Mascotto would like to think that, at some point, ESG integration could emerge as the “logical result of a long synthesis” folded into the regular investment process to ensure the long-term viability of the client investor.
所表达的意见是美国世纪投资（或基金经理）的意见，并不保证任何美国世纪投资基金的未来业绩。此信息仅用于教育目的，并非投资建议。
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