One month on from the Trump Tantrum – our outlook for 2017

As major economies deal with trade and currency issues, how will this affect their smaller trading partners? This webinar will discuss the implications of these issues on emerging markets.

Towards the SDGs: The Importance of Collaboration

Towards the SDGs: The importance of Innovation in Purchasing Practises

Towards the SDGs: Robust ES Data from Better Supply Chains Monitoring

Towards the SDGs: Possible Aspects of Future Regulations

See how the best advisors communicate with clients about sustainable investing. Sam will share examples of the essential foundations of a communications toolkit. Advisors will learn compelling ways to articulate:

- Their personal Sustainability Story
- Their Sustainable Investment Philosophy
- The Sustainable Investing Spectrum: ESG, SRI, and Impact

Sam is the CEO and co-founder of Vert Asset Management. Sam leads the development of new products and tools to make sustainable investing easier for financial advisors. He has been a featured speaker on sustainable investing at financial advisor conferences in the US, UK, Europe, and Australia.

Prior to launching Vert, Sam spent almost 20 years working at Dimensional Fund Advisors. He started Dimensional’s European Financial Advisor Services business and led the development and launch of their Global Sustainability Core Fund.
 
Sam has a BA in Philosophy from the University of Colorado, Boulder and an MBA in Finance from the University of California, Davis. Sam lives in Mill Valley, CA with his wife and three children.

The 2020s are being called the "Decade of Action" by the United Nations, who outlined the 17 Sustainable Development Goals in 2015. There have been uplifting developments in achieving these goals, driven by individuals and institutions alike.
Yet there is still work to be done, and goals-based investments provide solid ways to achieve the goals.
This webinar will explore:
- Promising projects investors are seeing in the market
- Updated metrics being used to measure success
- Risks to consider when identifying appropriate investments
+ more!

Panellists;
Sean Fisher, Business Development Manager, Pennine Wealth Solutions
Senior Rep, UBS Asset Management
Elgin Chau, Head of ESG Ratings, Act Analytics

Moderator: Christopher McLean, CEO, Stonechair Capital

Bonnie Lyn recently presented a TEDx Talk at the Fields Institute for Mathematical Sciences at the University of Toronto where she discussed The Impact of Math.

Her firm, The S Factor Co., supplies data and market insight on the Social Factors™ for ESG and Impact Investing; an area Ms. de Bartok has specialized in for over two decades around the globe.

The presentation is a deep dive into the Social Factors™ or the “S in ESG™” and its power of influence and performance in the realm of ESG considerations.

Key take a way’s for participants:

• The Information Gap
• Unstructured Data Sources
• Standardization
• Materiality
• Regulation
• Value Recognition
• Integration
• Quantitative Modelling
• Market signals

Bonnie-Lyn de Bartok, BA, MCBA

Bonnie-Lyn is the Founder and CEO of The S Factor Co., a MacCormick Inc. company. She brings over two decades of Social Impact, International Business, Finance and Technology background to the leadership of MacCormick Inc. and The S Factor Co.

Bonnie Lyn has won several entrepreneurial and technology awards, led the creation of both firms, expanding globally and has worked across 57 countries, and has led the creation of several proprietary products including the MSPI™ and the S Factor™ Solutions.

Her company has developed and is bringing to market, a proprietary algorithm and index that measures corporate social impact against, international standards, public sentiment and financial performance. She is a widely acknowledged expert and much sought after speaker on social impact and risk issues.

A graduate from Saint Mary’s University, in International Development Studies (Development Economics) and International Politics, Marketing, Finance and Micro-computer Technology.

Following GIIN’s 2018 Annual Impact Investor Survey, more than half of impact investors reported tracking some or all of their impact performance against the SDGs.
SDGs definition and framework for a better future offer the potential of standard and measurements for impact investing while catalyzing investments towards the goals. They can be a support to shift the focus of market participants towards positive impact investments, whereas the integration of ESG is considered as a tool for prudent risk management. Still, aligning SDGs is not as easy, we will go through:

- progresses
- hurdles
- requirements to scale up

The presentation will use concrete examples to illustrate the difficulties in implementing impact investing & what should be the focus of attention.

We appear to be entering the third era of ESG (Environment, Social, and Governance) investment integration. Existing data sets have been broadened to improve their coverage and their providers have clarified their methodologies. New data sets are available that offer insights that were not previously available. A wider range of asset owners are requesting investment products that have sustainability-related claims. This has prompted the creation of passive ETFs, single theme funds (e.g., gender lens, decarbonized), and various types of hedge funds (including long-short and short-only offerings).
The first generation of ESG investors used data on topics such as product involvement (alcohol, tobacco, gambling) or business practices (anti-union, involvement in Burma) to screen out “bad” companies. The second generation of ESG investors decided that a company’s sustainability performance should be related to its riskiness and/or its financial performance. Third generation investors appear to be looking for:
-A consistent signal. Investors want to integrate as much of the available ESG information as possible into factors that are comparable across all companies, industries, and countries.
-Broad coverage. ESG data influences investment in large cap, small cap, and emerging market equities. It is also increasingly important in fixed income investment processes.
-Many years of data history. Most portfolio management and quantitative analysis systems perform better when at least five years (and ideally ten years) of history is available.
-Integration with other sources of data. Investors would like ESG piped to their desktop and already linked with the other financial and market return data they normally use.
New ESG data providers are emerging that seek to meet these needs. The leader of this webinar, Bahar Gidwani, is a co-founder of one of these providers.

The idea of a “smart city” has grown from a novel idea into an innovative way to solve many environmental, social and governance (ESG) problems around the world. During this webinar, we will discuss how AI can help accelerate return on investment (ROI) in ESG investments. We will also examine use cases that have enabled diverse stakeholders to create value for customers. Research has shown, a common barrier to solving problems linked to sustainability is a lack of private sector funding. Funding is needed to invest in critical infrastructure and care for basic human needs everyone has in common - for example - access to clean energy, healthcare and housing to name a few. To that end, private sector collaboration in smart city initiatives require a simple, market - based approach with incentives aligned to profitability. This is the clear path to achieve our shared goal of sustainability, global scale and impact.

Takeaways:
- Reasons for investors to care about ESG issues
- How to use AI to accelerate return on investment (ROI)
- Examination of smart city use cases that create value for stakeholders

About the presenter:
Ed is regarded as a pioneer in the field of AI as well as a thought leader in global growth market development. Velocity AI is a venture studio that help clients design innovative ways to accelerate returns for smart city and ESG investors. His team’s focus is designing intelligent ecosystems to create innovative business models that generate billions of dollars in revenue for customers. Ed is on the board of advisors for the Voice Summit sponsored by Amazon Alexa and Google. He is also a member of the NVIDIA Inception community for founders creating revolutionary AI companies.

Ed is the Founder of the Mobile Health ID Initiative which was launched to provide access to healthcare for mothers & newborns in emerging markets. Ed was also the founder and chief architect of Virtual DNA - a global cybersecurity innovation firm.

WeeFin is a hybrid advisory firm whose purpose is to build the finance of tomorrow: transparent and collaborative. In a financial world seeking for meaning, WeeFin supports financial institutions in the execution of their transformation toward new sustainable business models, by leveraging the most recent technologies (big data, machine learning, ...)

By studying sustainability impact metrics from both the consumer side and producer side, WeeFin shows that investors are desperately seeking for impact metrics that do not exist yet.
Pierrick Arnault and Grégoire Hug will share their insights based on the most recent studies WeeFin research team have conducted.
The first one reviewed the investment practices of major French institutions using the information available in climate reports related to the French climate disclosure law -so-called "Article 173". The second study is a review of ESG metrics provided by more than 20 extra-financial data providers, market leaders as well as market challengers. Based on these experiences, they will provide their recommendations to investors willing to go forward.


Pierrick Arnault is Product Manager and Sustainable Finance Expert at WeeFin.
Grégoire Hug is Co-Founder and Head of Product at WeeFin.

This webinar is focused on “how” to integrate sustainability in strategy, processes and communication, as the “why and what” is well understood. The goal is to demystify the so-called alphabet soup of frameworks and acronyms, showing how each can be used in a co-ordinated fashion. This will allow the organisation and stakeholders understand the material topics, actions and metrics that drive impact.

- Understand the context
-- View society’s goals through the lens of the UN SDGs
-- Understand inputs using the IIRC 6 Capitals
-- Sustainability value drivers
-- GRI framework to define issues

- Identifying and engage with stakeholders
-- Include stakeholders
-- Documented and robust process

- Defining material topics and impacts
-- Peer and media review
-- SASB Materiality Map
-- Stakeholder engagement

- Establish baseline, targets and timelines using TCFD approach for major topics
-- Governance
-- Strategy
-- Rick management
-- Metrics and targets
-- Scenario analysis

- Implement action plans as part of integrated strategy
-- Governance structure
-- Executive responsibility
-- Compensation linked to non-financial factor performance
-- The learning organisation

- Measurement and validation
-- The need for transparency using the GRI Content Index
-- Validation with a recognised assurer
-- Assess management approach

- Report and communicate
-- Relate outcomes to the SDGs and IIRC 6 Capitals
-- Tie performance to long term financials

Ian Huggard is a senior business development and investor relations specialist with 30 years’ experience in Capital Markets. A trusted advisor to institutional investors and company management teams on issues relating to sustainability, strategy and financial analysis. After spending 15 years in the US and 15 years in Europe building successful businesses and leading high-performance teams within Investment Banks, he established Etoile Advisory in 2019.

A great decision-making process provides a clear competitive edge and enables learning that drives sustained performance, yet most fund managers still pay insufficient attention to this critical source of alpha. So how can investors capture this opportunity?

Join Magdalena Smith, founder of Behaviour Lab, in discussions on how analytics and behavioural science is being used to improve investment decisions to;

· Identify where there is value left on the table as a result of subjective decision-making

· Enable systemised and transparent decision-making processes

· Ensure sustained changes to behaviour, leading to improved annualised performance, typically in the range of 125-200bps

The team at Behaviour Lab of expert investors, data scientists, change management consultants and academics have helped, and continue to help, organisations worldwide and across the investment industry to become recognised leading players in their fields. They do so by reshaping the way individual investors, teams and organisations make decisions and facilitating them in maintaining this change.

Content

- Various ESG regulations and guidelines are currently under development on different EU and national levels
- On the EU level “the big 4” is under development including the EU taxonomy, the benchmarking regulation, the disclosure regulation and the Green Bond Standards
- EU supervisors (EIOPA, EBA, ESMA) are developing ESG guidelines for insurers, pension funds, banks and asset managers on the EU level
- National supervisors (e.g. BaFin in Germany, PRA in UK) are also developing guidelines for the national undertakings
- All regulations have in common that they distinguish between ESG-related financial risks (loss in market value of an asset) and the (positive / negative) impact on the environment and society
- ESG risk management will become an obligatory requirement for all asset classes and will be part of the regular investment and risk processes for all asset owners and asset managers
- Illiquid asset classes are very different from liquid asset classes due to the lack of data
- Therefore, ESG risk management approaches have to be implemented that take into account the lack of publicly available data for alternative investments
- This can be done through an ESG input management process where GP’s and portfolio companies deliver the relevant ESG data on a regular basis
- LP’s can use such ESG data for the standardised ESG risk reporting enabling them to compare different GP’s and asset classes in terms of the ESG risk and fulfil their regulatory requirements
- Concrete case studies will be discussed

CV Jegor Tokarevich

- CEO of SOF, a risk and reporting service provider focused on risk management and reporting for alternative investment and alternative investments
- Head & Initiator of professional development programmes (CAS AI / DAS AI) for alternative investments at the University of Oldenburg
- Co-Head of the BAI Working Group on Investor Regulations
- Member of the FinDatEx Working Group developing Solvency II reporting templates

The United Nation Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) are a collection of 17 global goals that can be considered a “blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all”. In this webinar, Ama Seery, ESG analyst at Janus Henderson, will discuss the journey that the Janus Henderson Global Sustainable Equity Strategy embarked upon to produce its first Annual Sustainability Report. Ama has ten years of sustainability experience and hold the Chartered Environmentalist designation. Prior to joining Janus Henderson, she worked as a sustainability professional in the property sector, certifying and constructing green buildings.

The webinar will include the following:

- Background on the Fund
- Drivers for the report
- Initial planning and drafts
- Final Report
- SDG Analysis
- Questions

EU BENCHMARK REGULATION & ISS ESG BENCHMARK SOLUTIONS

Manage Risks and Seize Opportunities Associated with the Low-Carbon Transition

On September 30, 2019, the European Commission’s Technical Expert Group on Sustainable Finance released a landmark report that laid out the requirements for two new climate benchmarks: the ‘EU Climate Transition Benchmark’ and the ‘EU Paris-aligned Benchmark’.

As many investors are still struggling to understand and determine how and to what extent they have to act and respond to the evolving requirements, ISS ESG would like to invite you to an informative webinar that addresses the current state of play.



Moderator: Janina Lichnofsky, Head of Client Success Germanic Markets, ISS ESG

Speakers

· Lydia Sandner, Regulatory Affairs Manager, ISS ESG

· Hernando Cortina, Head of Index Strategy, ISS ESG

· Fredrik Fogde, Head of Climate Research, ISS ESG

Holger Mertens, Nikko AM Head Portfolio Manager, shares his Global Credit Outlook for 2020. With valuations near historic highs, trade wars simmering in the background and central banks returning to the markets, Mertens shares how his team has positioned their portfolio for 2020. In addition to a strategic allocation to Asian Credit and an overweight to non-cyclical corporates, there are several areas of opportunity identified by Nikko AM’s Global Credit team.