Systematically incorporating material ESG factors into investment decision making to identify potential risks and opportunities and help improve long-term, risk-adjusted returns.

ESG integration happens at the same time as traditional financial analysis. ESG integration is about understanding the material factors that are important to a company as it helps create a clearer picture in order to better understand the potential impacts to long term value. A few examples of ESG factors include:

Applying positive or negative screens to include or exclude assets from the investment universe.

This is often referred to as investing in line with values or values alignment. ESG exclusions and screening can include positive/negative screening, socially responsible investing (SRI), inclusions/exclusions, ethical, faith, and norms-based investing, best-in-class, and seeking leaders’ strategies.

Investing in assets involved in a particular ESG-related theme or seeking to address a specific social or environmental issue. With thematic investing, there is an intentional allocation of capital to a specific investment theme (e.g. climate change, gender equity, sustainability-related categories).

There is significant investment into technologies that alleviate the threats to sustainability. At Christian Beaulieu Group, we call the technologies that help tackle the threats to sustainability “SusTech”—Sustainability through Technology. These include:

Investing in assets that intend to generate a measurable positive social or environmental impact. Impact is the third dimension of performance, alongside traditional financial risk and return. Impact investors want a return on their investment, but may also be willing to take a capital loss as long as there are tangible results for the investment. In that way, it is essential to measure the impact of this investment.

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