This Week in ESG and Impact Investing

We note that last week automaker  Volkswagen admitted  that “’defeat devices’ used to cheat emissions testing were installed in 11 million vehicles worldwide.” The admission resulted in the swift “resignation and prompt replacement of CEO Martin Winterkorn, and a 30-percent drop in the company’s stock..” Volkswagen will be removed from the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (DJSI) as of October 6 (showing, once again, just how unreliable these index measures are).   Some time ago (2011), we  quantified the impact environmental factors have on stock prices  using several statistical techniques. Our analysis showed that investors and publicly traded companies must recognize the impact environmental incidents and issues have on a given firm's ability to use company assets and therefore generate revenue and profits. As we stated on February 5, 2015 in testimony to the  Norwegian Ministry  of Finance and on April 22, 2015 in testimony to the Governmen...

As noted in Testimony to the Council of the District of Columbia on Thursday, March 12, 2015:  “Our 2016 Fully Adjusted Return® forecast for the City suggests a crisis may be coming soon in the August/October (2015) timeframe."  (The testimony can be found at: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bx3S91AlzNJ4RGF0WTZQd05Ha3M/view?usp=sharing and https://youtu.be/rlr_DomOais  below:) One newspaper recently reported a "growing fear that the District is less safe. This fear resides with the City’s gentrifiers, not its natives, since Black male DC natives have been subject to elevated murder risk for decades. The truth is that as long as Blacks are the victims, Washington, DC's murder rate has never been a concern for the DC City Council or their masters, the Congress of the United States, our Constitutionally anointed overseers. Failing to recognize that synthetic drugs, domestic violence, and illegal guns are all factors in the increase in homicides anchors this lac...