This Week in ESG and Impact Investing

On April 1, "The People’s Bank of China (PBOC)’s Institute of International Finance" identified "cryptocurrencies as a top priority for 2018,": citing the potential systemic risk that "widespread retail investment into cryptocurrencies" posed to the Yuan. The article below summarizes the Mandarin-language only report. Status and Outlook (1) Status Quo • Global cryptocurrency is growing explosively. As of March 10th, 2018, there were more than 1,500 types of cryptocurrency, totalling $389.1 billion in value. The market value for the top 10 cryptocurrencies stands at $321.1 billion and accounts for 80% of the total cryptocurrency market value. • A wide variety of institutions are involved in the issuance of cryptocurrency. Private sector players include financial institutions and large e-commerce platforms. On a national level, Tunisia, Senegal, Ecuador and Venezuela have issued legal cryptocurrency. • Existing problems: the issuance of crypto

In what must be considered a successful and interesting approach, the KNOW Identity Conference focused on identity related issues and identity related investment opportunities. The first speaker was Edward Snowden, appearing via Skype from an undisclosed location. Mr. Snowden made a number of interesting comments. He noted the government’s primary role in the provision of authenticated documents relating to identity. Indeed, supplying “identity” is one of the core functions of a modern government. Mr. Snowden suggested that governments focus on enabling people to interact with one another, secure in the knowledge of true identity. This needs to be facilitated both locally and globally, that is, you need to communicate securely (secure with respect to knowing the identity of the other person) over both great distances and/or over a shop counter. As a way of facilitating this thinking, Mr. Snowden noted that one of the core ways to enhance identity is to have governments ask th