Climate Change & ESG Investing

This is a full-term elective investigating how climate and Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) concepts can be integrated into investment strategies to simultaneously generate financial performance of enhanced returns or reduced risk and achieve real-world outcomes. The class presents the framework of the Double Bottom Line or Double Materiality of both financial performance and real-world outcomes. The focus is on developing and evaluating investment strategies in public markets to achieve both aims from a practitioner’s perspective. Guest speakers will also address how climate change and ESG considerations are being integrated into investment products in a rapidly evolving commercial landscape. A key deliverable of the course is for students to apply the double bottom-line framework to propose a climate-related or an ESG investment strategy of their own and demonstrate how it purports to meet both investment and real-world outcomes.