Overview
Responsible investment is an increasingly important topic for alternative investment managers. This umbrella term, which covers everything from screening securities from an investment portfolio to actively engaging with portfolio companies, is becoming more popular both with managers and their investors. For many, the use of responsible investment is seen as a way of mitigating investment risk; for some it is seen as a way of expressing one’s ethical beliefs while generating returns.
AIMA sees responsible investment as a series of possible actions, sitting on a spectrum of intenseness and impact:
- Socially responsible investment: the act of screening certain securities or asset classes from a portfolio.
- Environmental, social, governance (ESG) factors: identifying traits of a security that may not have been taken into account by that security’s price, but which may affect its desirability.
- Engagement: seeking to influence the behaviour of a company in which a fund is invested in order to improve their environmental, social, and governance practices.
- Impact investing: investments made in order to deliberately create social goods.
We seek to support the alternative investment management industry as it comes to terms with responsible investment. To that end, we work with our Responsible Investment Working Group of industry members to develop sound practice and other guides, and to communicate to our members what investors care most about in this field.
We also work to inform the regulatory debate around responsible investment. As regulators around the world take more of an interest in sustainability it is crucial that they avoid stifling innovation or creating artificial markets. As such AIMA has released a series of policy principles, which can be found in our Responsible Investment Primer. We believe that responsible investment regulation should be:
- Investor-led
- Principles-based
- Proportionate
- Non-duplicative
- Consistent
- Practical
- Broad-based
In order to get involved with AIMA work in this space, or to sign on to our distribution list for responsible investment news, please contact Max Budra at [email protected]
AIMA Guidance
- Q&A on Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (21 December 2020)
- AIMA and Clifford Chance Guide on the EU Taxonomy Regulation (06 November 2020)
- ESG Primer for Asset Managers in Asia (29 October 2020)
- Short Selling and Responsible Investment (22 July 2020)
- AIMA Responsible Investment Primer (22 May 2020)
- AIMA & Maples Guide to the EU Sustainable Disclosure Regulation (14 May 2020)
- AIMA Policy and Practice: ESG Considerations at Alternative Investment Management Firms (15 January 2020)
- AIMA Responsible Investment Policies for Hedge Fund Firms (15 January 2020)
AIMA Responses
- Q&A on Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (21 December 2020)
- AIMA response to ESMA consultation on Taxonomy Art 8 (04 December 2020)
- AIMA and Clifford Chance Guide on the EU Taxonomy Regulation (06 November 2020)
- AIMA Response to CFA ESG Disclosure Standards for Investment Products (26 October 2020)
- AIMA and MFA response to the ESAs consultation on Disclosure Regulation RTS (03 September 2020)
- AIMA Submits Response to MAS Public Consultation for Environment Risk Management Guidelines (19 August 2020)
- AIMA Submits Response to SFC Soft Consultation on Proposed Regulatory Responses to Climate Change (19 August 2020)
- AIMA and MFA response to EU consultation on a renewed sustainable finance strategy (15 July 2020)
- AIMA and MFA response to European Commission on DDAs re sustainability factors (06 July 2020)
- ISLA: Responsible Investment, Hedge Funds and Short Selling (10 February 2020)
- Summary: EU regulatory push on ESG and responsible investment (21 August 2019)
- Joint AIMA and MFA response to ESMA Survey on Short-Termism (29 July 2019)
- AIMA Summary on ESG Disclosures Regulation (30 April 2019)
- AIMA and MFA response to IOSCO's consultation report (01 April 2019)
- AIMA response to ESMA Consultation Paper on Integrating Sustainability Risks and Factors in MiFID II (19 February 2019)
- AIMA response to ESMA Consultation Paper on Integrating Sustainability Risks and Factors in the UCITS Directive and AIFMD (19 February 2019)
- AIMA responds to FCA consultation on Green Finance (05 February 2019)
- AIMA response to IOSCO Statement on Disclosure of ESG Matters by Issuers (30 January 2019)
- AIMA publishes position on European Parliament’s report on investment firms’ review (20 November 2018)
- AIMA Position Paper - ESG EP Amendments (17 October 2018)
- FCA issues discussion paper detailing a proposed approach to climate change and green finance based around increased disclosures by regulated firms (16 October 2018)
- AIMA response to the European Commission proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and Council on disclosures relating to sustainable investments and sustainability risks and amending Directive (EU) 2016/2341 (22 August 2018)
- AIMA and MFA response to the Consultation on Institutional Investors and Asset Managers' duties regarding sustainability (22 January 2018)
Resources
- Event Summary: Short Selling and Responsible Investment (28 September 2020)
- Panel Discussion: Short Selling and Responsible Investment (28 September 2020)
- AQR - Responsible Investing: The ESG-Efficient Frontier (01 October 2019)
- Kotsantonis and Serafeim: Four Things No One Will Tell You About ESG Data (15 July 2019)
- Hermes: Pricing ESG Risk in Sovereign Credit (01 July 2019)
- SEC Commission Hester Peirce: Scarlet Letters: Remarks before the American Enterprise Institute (18 June 2019)
- FTSE Russell: Europe continues to lead in ESG smart beta (13 June 2019)
- The role of ESG factors in sovereign debt investing (23 May 2019)
- LGT Capital Partners: ESG to SDGs: the road ahead (01 May 2019)
- Amundi: The Alpha and Beta of ESG investing (27 November 2018)