Sustainable PDF Download

Author: Terrence Keeley
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231556667
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 477

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Book Description
Should business and finance play larger roles in resolving the great social and environmental challenges of our time? Proponents of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing say yes. They argue that ESG financial strategies can help reverse runaway carbon emissions and fix income and gender inequalities, among other ills. ESG-integrated investments already encompass more than $120 trillion in financial assets. Are they working as promised? If not, how can they be improved? In Sustainable, a finance-industry veteran offers an insider’s look at the promises, prospects, and perils of ESG investing. Terrence Keeley argues that many ESG advocates have been overly optimistic about what it can accomplish. Divestment threats are ineffective tools for altering corporate behavior, and verifiably “good” companies do not systematically generate great returns. Most importantly, business and finance cannot cure social ills on their own: regulators, public policies, civil society, and individuals must all play specific, complementary roles to shape the future we want. Keeley provides comprehensive solutions that would promote more inclusive, sustainable growth. In particular, he recommends reallocating capital from some indexed products toward an emerging class of strategies with more verifiable social and environmental benefits. Keeley identifies dozens of alternative “impact investing” strategies that could generate true double bottom lines. He also highlights promising civic organizations with proven methodologies for achieving widely shared benefits at scale. Proposing practical, actionable, and in many cases profitable solutions to social and environmental problems, Sustainable offers an incisive vision of the roles business and finance can and should play in building a flourishing society.

Author: Jon Lukomnik
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 100037615X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 175

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Book Description
Moving Beyond Modern Portfolio Theory: Investing That Matters tells the story of how Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT) revolutionized the investing world and the real economy, but is now showing its age. MPT has no mechanism to understand its impacts on the environmental, social and financial systems, nor any tools for investors to mitigate the havoc that systemic risks can wreck on their portfolios. It’s time for MPT to evolve. The authors propose a new imperative to improve finance’s ability to fulfil its twin main purposes: providing adequate returns to individuals and directing capital to where it is needed in the economy. They show how some of the largest investors in the world focus not on picking stocks, but on mitigating systemic risks, such as climate change and a lack of gender diversity, so as to improve the risk/return of the market as a whole, despite current theory saying that should be impossible. "Moving beyond MPT" recognizes the complex relations between investing and the systems on which capital markets rely, "Investing that matters" embraces MPT’s focus on diversification and risk adjusted return, but understands them in the context of the real economy and the total return needs of investors. Whether an investor, an MBA student, a Finance Professor or a sustainability professional, Moving Beyond Modern Portfolio Theory: Investing That Matters is thought-provoking and relevant. Its bold critique shows how the real world already is moving beyond investing orthodoxy.

Author: Mariya Stefanova
Publisher: Pearson Education
ISBN: 0133593118
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
Private Equity Accounting, Investor Reporting and Beyond takes the discussion around private equity accounting to the next level beyond the basic private equity accounting principles identifying areas of importance where things can go wrong and delving into the intimate details of the different sub-asset classes such as real estate funds, infrastructure funds, debt funds, mezzanine funds, fund-of-funds (FoF) and other Limited Partners (large institutional investors, pension funds, university endowments, etc). The book also adds a new perspective - the perspective of the Limited Partners (LPs) investing in private equity allowing the LPs to have a peek at the private equity kitchen and its processes where all the General Partner (GP) accounts, investor reports and capital statements are forged and provides them with essential tips on what to check in GP reports and what the pitfalls of LP accounting for PE investments are. Starting with the main changes in the private equity landscape, the impact of private equity structures on the accounting and reporting, the importance of allocations and allocation rules, the reasons of their existence and the impact on investor reports of getting them wrong, highlighting some neglected processes (e.g. rebalancing, partner transfers) and common mistakes to some essential guidance and best practice of carried interest modelling, The Advanced Guide reveals intimate secrets of these processes previously available only by learning from peers. The Advanced Guide also elaborates on various reporting frameworks (ILPA Quarterly Reporting Best Practice, IPEV Investor Reporting Guidelines) and additional layers of reporting (ESG Reporting) and their specifics. The chapter on private equity valuations provides some invaluable guidance on valuations for different types of instruments such us non-controlling interest, fund interests (for LPs), private loans, not-traded debt and other debt instruments and provides an update on some current discussions such as the unit of account and the use of mathematical models (e.g. Option Pricing Models, Probability-expected Weighted Return Models) in private equity. Performance measurement is also taken to a whole new level discussing not only traditional performance metrics such as IRR and multiples and revealing some major flaws in the IRR as a traditional metric used by private equity, but also suggesting some new advanced performance metrics used by the most sophisticated GPs and LPs. Drawing on extensive experience as a practitioner and instructor, Mariya Stefanova reviews all the details and processes that private equity firms and fund accountants should follow, identifying both current best practices and costly pitfalls to avoid. Replete with up-to-date, user-friendly examples from all main jurisdictions, this guide explains the precise workings and lifecycles of private equity funds; reviews commercial terms; compares structures and their current tax treatments; shows how to read Limited Partnership Agreements; and much more.

Author: European Investment Bank
Publisher: European Investment Bank
ISBN: 9286150873
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 266

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Book Description
COVID-19 set new challenges for the economies in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Strong policy and fiscal support allowed businesses to stay afloat, with firms making long strides in innovation and in becoming global suppliers. This report examines the pandemic's business impact, trade and innovation, green economy and the financial gaps in this region. The report's analysis is based on the EBRD-EIB-WBG Enterprise Survey 2019, covering over 28 000 registered firms, and the first round of the COVID-19 Follow-up Enterprise Surveys, with over 16 000 firms.

Author: Ben Yuk Fai Fong
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 9819944910
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 518

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Book Description
This book provides a timely review on what has been accomplished, and what remains amiss, following the World Health Organization’s 1978 ‘Health for All’ campaign, by identifying enduring gaps in health care within a global context. The WHO declaration of "Health for All by the Year 2000" mapped out a road towards primary health care for all people and demarcated it as essential for human progress in terms of economic development and social justice. However, 45 years have gone by, and most societies and countries have yet achieved 'health for all’, despite so much having changed in technology, disease patterns, and population demographics. In promoting community health and improving service delivery, the book advocates the development and implementation of “All For Health” strategies to steer stakeholders in the right direction towards universal health care. The book covers the gaps and actions in health improvements, the ‘All For Health’ strategies, and the Health in All Policies (HiAP), reviewing and discussing issues through both Asian and international examples. Contributors include both academics and practitioners from diverse professional backgrounds including medicine, nursing, pharmacy, allied health, dietetics, social sciences, life sciences, education, business, administration, law, and public policy. Essential to scholars in public health and related disciplines, this book is also useful to policymakers, community and public health practitioners, and health care executives and interns.

Author: Pedro Matos
Publisher: CFA Institute Research Foundation
ISBN: 1944960988
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 80

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Book Description
This survey examines the vibrant academic literature on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing. While there is no consensus on the exact list of ESG issues, responsible investors increasingly assess stocks in their portfolios based on nonfinancial data on environmental impact (e.g., carbon emissions), social impact (e.g., employee satisfaction), and governance attributes (e.g., board structure). The objective is to reduce exposure to investments that pose greater ESG risks or to influence companies to become more sustainable. One active area of research at present involves assessing portfolio risk exposure to climate change. This literature review focuses on institutional investors, which have grown in importance such that they have now become the largest holders of shares in public companies globally. Historically, institutional investors tended to concentrate their ESG efforts mostly on corporate governance (the “G” in ESG). These efforts included seeking to eliminate provisions that restrict shareholder rights and enhance managerial power, such as staggered boards, supermajority rules, golden parachutes, and poison pills. Highlights from this section: · There is no consensus on the exact list of ESG issues and their materiality. · The ESG issue that gets the most attention from institutional investors is climate change, in particular their portfolio companies’ exposure to carbon risk and “stranded assets.” · Investors should be positioning themselves for increased regulation, with the regulatory agenda being more ambitious in the European Union than in the United States. Readers might come away from this survey skeptical about the potential for ESG investing to affect positive change. I prefer to characterize the current state of the literature as having a “healthy dose of skepticism,” with much more remaining to be explored. Here, I hope the reader comes away with a call to action. For the industry practitioner, I believe that the investment industry should strive to achieve positive societal goals. CFA Institute provides an exemplary case in its Future of Finance series (www.cfainstitute.org/research/future-finance). For the academic community, I suggest we ramp up research aimed at tackling some of the open questions around the pressing societal goals of ESG investing. I am optimistic that practitioners and academics will identify meaningful ways to better harness the power of global financial markets for addressing the pressing ESG issues facing our society.

Author: Stuart Hart
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 150363874X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 521

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Book Description
From the author of Capitalism at the Crossroads, a call to consciousness—and action—for individuals, organizations, communities, and nations. Our current Milton Friedman–style "shareholder primacy capitalism," as taught in business schools and embraced around the world, has become dangerous for society, the climate, and the planet. Moreover, Stuart L. Hart argues, it's economically unnecessary. But there are surprising reasons for hope—from the history of capitalism itself. Beyond Shareholder Primacy argues that capitalism has reformed itself twice before and is poised for a third major reformation. Retelling the origin story of capitalism from the fifteenth century to the present, Hart argues that a radically sustainable, just capitalism is possible, and even likely, in our lifetime. Hart describes what it will take to move beyond capitalism's present worship of "shareholder primacy," including reforms to all major economic institutions. A key requirement is eliminating the "externalities" (or collateral damage) of our current shareholder capitalism. Sustainable capitalism will explicitly incorporate the needs of society and the planet, include a financial system that allows leaders to prioritize the planet, reorganize business schools around sustainable management thinking, and enable corporations not just to stop ignoring the damage they cause, but actually begin to create positive impact.

Author: Sabri Boubaker
Publisher: World Scientific
ISBN: 1800610793
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 857

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Book Description
The COVID-19 global health pandemic, which started in late December 2019, forced many countries to adopt unusual measures such as social distancing and strict lockdowns. It changed many of our certainties and practices, including the foundations of the market-led version of capitalism, by bringing social and health considerations back to the forefront of firms' considerations, investors' strategies and governments' priorities. Under the effects of this unprecedented crisis, all sectors of finance and real economy have been seriously affected.Health uncertainties and their increasing consequences for human life and activities require stronger and faster actions to shape pathways towards sustainability and better resilience. The COVID-19 health crisis is a visible part of a greater iceberg: the World Health Organization has tracked, over recent years, a large number of epidemic events around the world, suggesting that many other similar diseases could appear and evolve in the future from epidemic to pandemic in a globalized world.Financial Transformations Beyond the COVID-19 Health Crisis was specifically designed to provide the readers with new results, recent findings and future outlook on the impacts of COVID-19 on financial markets, firm behaviors, and finance and investment strategies. It favors multidimensional perspectives and brings together conceptual, empirical and policy-oriented chapters, using quantitative and qualitative methods alike. This is a timely and comprehensive collection of theoretical, empirical and policy contributions from renowned scholars around the world, and provides the thoughts and insights required to rethink the financial sector in the event of new shocks of the same nature.

Author: Seema Joshi
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 981993401X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 227

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Book Description
This book explores theoretical and empirical perspectives on corporate governance and sustainability and reflects upon India’s three decades of corporate governance reforms. It provides a solid base of information culled from extensive empirical research. It will contribute to the 2030 agenda of the United Nations on Sustainable Development Goals by lighting the way forward and enhancing the convergence of corporate governance with sustainability in business entities. Adopting a credible and uniform sustainability reporting framework and cultivating a pervasive “sustainability culture” through effective “sustainability leadership” has become a business imperative. It will be highly relevant for all stakeholders, including shareholders, boards of directors, managers, academicians, and researchers, and it will empower, enrich, and enable them to gain more conceptual clarity and empirical understanding of corporate governance and sustainability issues. In addition, it shows the pathway for policymakers and practitioners to address the myriad challenges that emanate from sustainability by suggesting new approaches emerging in the critical domain of corporate governance.

Author: Steven P. Erie
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 9780804751407
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 388

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Book Description
Examines the history of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, from its obscure 1920s-era origins, through the Colorado River Aqueduct and State Water Projects, to today's daunting mission of drought management, water quality, environmental stewardship, and post-9/11 supply security. Simultaneous.