scholarly journals Socially responsible investing through the equity funds in the global ownership network

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (8) ◽  
pp. e0256160
Author(s):  
Takayuki Mizuno ◽  
Shohei Doi ◽  
Takahiro Tsuchiya ◽  
Shuhei Kurizaki
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Funds ◽  
Corporate Control ◽  
Voting Rights ◽  
Socially Responsible ◽  
Responsible Investing ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Equity Funds ◽  
Investment Management Companies ◽  
Asset Managers ◽  
Ultimate Owners

We analyze the connectivity of equity investments to the firms in the global ownership network that are reported as non-compliant with Environment, Social, and Government (ESG) benchmarks. We find that a large number of shareholders have ownership linkages to non-ESG firms, most commonly with three or four degrees of separation. Analyzing the betweenness centrality for shareholders connecting the ultimate owners and non-ESG firms, we find that the investment management companies play important roles in channeling the investment money into non-ESG firms, where largest American asset managers commonly have one to two degrees of separation on their ownership linkages to those problematic firms. Since asset managers collect capital from investors by running the equity funds, we analyze the ownership stakes and the associated voting rights attributable to the equity funds investors. We estimate the distribution of the power of corporate control over non-ESG firms among specific asset managers (such as BlackRock and Fidelity) and among different types of the equity funds (such as mutual funds and exchanged-traded funds), and explores how investing in the equity funds rather than ownership investing may have shifted the distribution of the power to control those non-ESG firms.

scholarly journals The Rise of Institutional Investors

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Fichtner
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Funds ◽  
Hedge Funds ◽  
Institutional Investors ◽  
Private Equity ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Equity Funds ◽  
Private Equity Funds ◽  
Important Position ◽  
State Street ◽  
Asset Managers

During the last decades, institutional investors gained an ever more important position as managers of assets and owners of corporations. By demanding (short-term) shareholder value, some of them have driven the financialization of corporations and of the financial sector itself. This chapter first characterizes the specific roles that private equity funds, hedge funds, and mutual funds have played in this development. It then moves on to focus on one group of institutional investors that is rapidly becoming a pivotal factor for corporate control in many countries – the “Big Three” large passive asset managers BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street.

The effect of business cycle, market return and momentum on financial performance of socially responsible investing mutual funds

2017 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 513-528 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen Paul
Keyword(s):  
Business Cycle ◽  
Financial Performance ◽  
Mutual Funds ◽  
Factor Model ◽  
Social Performance ◽  
Socially Responsible ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Responsible Investing ◽  
Market Return ◽  
Three Factor

Purpose This study examines the effect of business cycle, market return and momentum on the financial performance of socially responsible investing (SRI) mutual funds using data from two complete business cycles as defined by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). Design/methodology/approach A “fund of funds” approach is used to identify the extent to which SRI financial performance is affected by the macroeconomic climate. The Fama-French Three-Factor model and the Carhart four-factor model are used to bring the results into alignment with commonly used finance methodologies. Findings The results indicate that SRI tends to preserve value during economic contraction more than it adds value during economic expansion. Market return is important during both expansion and contraction, while momentum is important only during expansion. Research limitations/implications These findings suggest that double screening, for both financial and social performance, enables portfolio managers of SRI funds to have insight into those companies that are particularly vulnerable during times of economic contraction. Practical implications These results bring added clarity to the mixed findings found by previous researchers examining the relationship between corporate social performance (CSP) and financial performance. Social implications This study reinforces the idea that the financial performance of companies with high ethical standards is comparable to the financial performance of the market as a whole during times of economic expansion and superior to the market as a whole during times of economic contraction. Originality/value Business cycle analysis, along with the Fama-French Three-Factor model and the Carhart four-factor model, brings SRI research more into the realm of conventional financial analysis than previous studies.

scholarly journals Performance Evaluation of SRI Funds: An Analysis of Fund Types

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 212 ◽  
Author(s):  
Halil Kiymaz
Keyword(s):  
Performance Evaluation ◽  
Mutual Funds ◽  
Control Sample ◽  
Socially Responsible Investing ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Fixed Income ◽  
Socially Responsible ◽  
Responsible Investing

Socially responsible investing (SRI) continues to get the attention of both practitioners and academicians as the demands for these funds increased sharply during the last decade. This study provides additional evidence on performances of SRI in mutual funds. The empirical findings show that although SRI funds experience lower average returns relative to the non-SRI control sample and various benchmarks, they provide higher returns relative to the control group and benchmarks using various risk adjusted measures. Among the subgroups analyzed, SRI Fixed Income funds offer the highest risk adjusted returns to investors while SRI Global funds provide the lowest returns. Finally, using Jensen’s alpha for individual funds, we find that about half of the funds experience negative alphas and 20 percent of SRI funds have statistically significant negative alphas compared to 7 percent of funds with that of positive alphas. Overall, the findings show mixed results concerning SRIs performance. 

Socially responsible investing: a review of the critical issues

2015 ◽  
Vol 41 (11) ◽  
pp. 1176-1201 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joan Junkus ◽  
Thomas D. Berry
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Funds ◽  
Firm Value ◽  
Socially Responsible Investing ◽  
Model Specification ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Socially Responsible ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Responsible Investment ◽  
Definitive Answer ◽  
Responsible Investing

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide a review of the most recent work in major finance journals on socially responsible investment (SRI). While SRI involves individual investors, firms, and investment managers, the authors concentrate primarily on the investment view. Design/methodology/approach – The authors briefly review the development of socially responsible investing (SRI) and the theoretical issues related to SRI and investment choice. This is followed by a review of the empirical results concerning firm value. The question of whether SR mutual funds and SR indexes differ in performance or other characteristics from their conventional counterparts is discussed next, and lastly the authors present suggestions for future research directions. Findings – Despite the large and extensive amount of empirical research published on SRI in recent years, the authors find no definitive answer to the question of SR actions for either the firm or the investor. For firms, evidence linking corporate social responsibility (CSR) rankings with higher value is mixed, and depends on the type of CSR behavior studied as well as the measures of firm performance used. The performance of SR mutual funds and indexes generally are not significantly different from conventional funds or indexes, but again these results are also highly dependent on model specification, time period, benchmark, and other characteristics of the study. Practical implications – The value of SR investing has not been definitely proved. This means, however, that there is room for further on this important topic. Originality/value – This paper synthesizes and presents the most recent research on SRI from a wide variety of refereed sources.

Socially responsible investing: performance evaluation of BRICS nations

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 525-547
Author(s):  
Vanita Tripathi ◽  
Amanpreet Kaur
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Socially Responsible Investing ◽  
Socially Responsible ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Crisis Period ◽  
Responsible Investing ◽  
Brics Countries ◽  
Regulatory Bodies ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Asset Managers

PurposeThe study aims to contribute towards the sustainable development of financial systems, by testing the performance of socially responsible investing alternatives in emerging BRICS countries. The study outcomes give us an insight into viability of responsible financial decisions in contrast with the conventional style of investing.Design/methodology/approachThe authors examine the performance of socially responsible indices of BRICS nations vis-à-vis respective conventional market indices using various risk-adjusted measures and conditional volatility measures. We further segregate the 12-year study period to crisis and non-crisis period particular to the respective country, as well as a common global financial crisis period to analyze the impact of market conditions in BRICS nations and observe the performance using dummy regression analysis. Conditional volatility of the stochastic index series is measured using ARCH-GARCH analysis. Fama Decomposition Model helps rank the index performance through the sub-periods.FindingsFama Decomposition Model helps us observe that while Brazil secures a position in top rankers consistently, it is India that ranks top during crisis period. With evidence of outperformance in terms of risk-return by SRI indices of BRICS countries through the overall period as well as through different market conditions, our study contributes to the positive literature on socially responsible investing.Research limitations/implicationsThe study explores performance of SRI in BRICS and finds evidence of the sustainable investment to be non-penalizing to the investor, even as the performance trend remain distinct in the countries with same level of development. It has implications for the investors and asset managers to include responsible stocks, while for the companies and regulatory bodies to unite for better reporting and disclosures. Given the broad implications, future research is required to link the impact of various cultural, legislative and demographic factors on the level and performance of the socially responsible investment in BRICS nations.Practical implicationsThe current study evaluating and comparing performances of the socially responsible investments in BRICS nations puts forth following implications for the different sectors of the society, especially in emerging countries: (1) BRICS organization – The association of five economic giants, having significant influence over global as well as regional affairs, can aim to orient the countries' efforts towards collective sustainable development by designing uniform SRI framework. (2) Investors – In the globalization era, the investor can gain from ethical cross border investments to diversification and country benefits. (3) Companies and regulatory bodies – Only voluntary or mandatory unified efforts, to provide accurate and consistent disclosures, can upscale the mediocre growth trends of sustainable investing in emerging economies. (4) Asset Managers – Call of greater role in educating, warding off inhibitions related to RI.Originality/valueThis is to certify that the research paper submitted by us is an outcome of our independent and original work. We have duly acknowledged all the sources from which the ideas and extracts have been taken. The project is free from any plagiarism and has not been submitted elsewhere for publication.

Ranking Socially Responsible Mutual Funds

2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-84 ◽  
Author(s):  
Blanca Pérez-Gladish ◽  
Paz Méndez ◽  
Bouchra M’Zali
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Mutual Funds ◽  
Investment Decision ◽  
Multicriteria Decision Making ◽  
Individual Investors ◽  
Socially Responsible ◽  
Ethical Investing ◽  
Responsible Investing ◽  
Investment Decision Making ◽  
Socially Responsible Mutual Funds

Socially Responsible Investing (SRI), also known as sustainable or ethical investing, corresponds to an investment practice that takes into account not only the usual return-risk criteria, but also other non-financial dimensions, namely in terms of environmental, social and governance concerns. Recently, given the causes of the 2008 financial crisis, these concerns became even more relevant. However, while a diverse set of models have been developed to support investment decision-making based on financial criteria, models including also socially responsible criteria are rather scarce. The main objective of this paper is to contribute to try fulfilling this gap on the financial literature, suggesting a Multicriteria Decision Making tool which allows individual investors to analyze and rank socially responsible mutual funds based on their environmental, social and governance performance and taking into account the individual, subjective, personal preferences of each investor.

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