Do you know what happens to your money? Sure, yesterday you paid for the weekly shopping and last week for your son’s new winter jacket. But I don’t mean the money. I mean the money that is possibly (hopefully well dispersed) in investment funds so that it can at least multiply a little there.
I’ll tell you honestly: I didn’t know until recently. And that despite the fact that I am a business journalist and constantly read articles by colleagues who rub my nose that it is really not that difficult to check a portfolio for sustainability.
If you are now wondering whether this is really the Climate Friday newsletter and not the SZ money newsletter (which you can subscribe to here if you like): Yes, you are still in the right place, if you are are more interested in the climate than in finance. But the two cannot really be separated from each other. After all, money all too often makes all the difference when it comes to the climate.
The subject of finance is exhausting, but important – just like the subject of the climate
There is no month in which the volume of donations in Germany is as high as in December. In the coming weeks, people will donate for all sorts of things: the Red Cross, the animal shelter in the neighboring village, a children’s aid organization, Greenpeace. All very honorable. But why not do something good with your own savings all year round, and do it on the side?
In fact, it’s pretty easy to do with a fund on a sustainable index. There are now quite a few indices that exclude certain companies from the outset, for example companies that earn their money with weapons, nuclear energy or pornography. A few days ago, however, one Study by the NGO Finanzwende showed that funds that are certified as sustainable also fuel the climate crisis because they invest the investors’ money indirectly in coal, oil or gas. This does not correspond to my view of sustainability. Thankfully, my colleague Victor Gojdka then wrote down how you can check in three steps whether your own financial products are climate-friendly. And in this text he took a close look at five well-known eco-index funds and saw whether they keep their promises.
And yes, I know you’re still here because you care about the climate, not the money. But the point is, if investors in certain companies stop buying shares or fund companies throw them out, then it suddenly becomes much more difficult for these companies to get fresh capital. And financial market researchers at the University of Augsburg have found that, on average, the CO₂ emissions of these companies even fall when funds have sold their shares. What happens on the stock exchange can definitely make a difference for the climate in the medium term. And it doesn’t matter where you store your savings.
I wish you a nice weekend, at least in the south of Germany with a little fresh snow again.
(This text is from the weekly Newsletter Environmental Friday you here free of charge can order.)