Sustainability is on everyone‘s mind, but for it to have more than just a marketing purpose, a coherent approach is needed. One of the problems is, that there is no clear and correct definition of sustainability. Often, little efforts are made to pursue integrated approaches, which leads to missing comprehensive and coherent sustainable strategies.
Thus, the problem of „Greenwashing“ arises, i.e. individual products or activities are presented as sustainable, which leads to deception among consumers and investors and deflects from real sustainable benefits.
Avoiding Greenwashing is a major challenge in any sustainability strategy and is at the heart of MainSky‘s sustainability efforts.
In order to make sure that greenwashing is avoided, MainSky‘s sustainability approach combines exclusion principles, optimization of the ESG score, and requires a positive ecological impact of the investment. In this way, different aspects of the sustainability issue are linked and isolated solutions are avoided. As a result, very high sustainability scores can be achieved, as is the case with our two mutual funds.
MainSky Asset Management AG offers investors the possibility to have their investments optimized according to ethical, social and sustainable criteria. The MainSky principle is to exclude unethical investments and at the same time, if possible, to achieve a positive environmental impact through investments. The MainSky sustainability policy is based on the MSCI SRI methodology.
Thus, companies are excluded which are active in controversial business areas. This is the case when companies generate significant revenues by manufacturing or distributing the following products: Controversial weapons (e.g. landmines, cluster bombs, weapons of mass destruction, nuclear weapons), civilian handguns, adult entertainment, alcohol, gambling, nuclear energy, coal for power plants, genetically modified organisms (GMOs), and tobacco products.
In addition, investments are not made in companies that engage in controversial business practices. These include companies that violate one or more of the ten principles of the United Nations Global Compact. These consist of requirements regarding human and labor rights as well as environmental protection and corruption.
On the other hand, MainSky considers Green Bonds in the investment universe in order to achieve a positive environmental impact through the provision of financial resources.
Green Bonds are fixed-income securities whose proceeds are used for projects that promote the ecological sustainability of the economy. Green bonds are an instrument within the framework of „impact investing“. By investing in green bonds, investors help achieve the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement and the UN 2030 Sustainability Agenda.
Issuers include sovereigns, government development banks, corporations, and supranational organizations.
Otherwise, however, they are identical to conventional bonds, i.e. they have the same structure, the same risk and (largely) the same performance characteristics.
The problem is that there is no clear and „correct“ definition of sustainability. Often, little integrated „island approaches“ are pursued, which focus on individual aspects of sustainability, but without a comprehensive and coherent sustainability strategy.
This can lead to the problem of „greenwashing“. In this case, a single product or activity is put in a green light, but in fact there is a very unecological company or business model behind it.
Ultimately, greenwashing can only be uncovered by conducting a deep analysis and examining various aspects of the sustainability issue. At MainSky, various aspects such as exclusion principles, the optimization of the ESG score and the achievement of a positive environmental impact of the investment are therefore intertwined. In this way, very high sustainability scores can be achieved, as is the case,with our two mutual funds.
The EU taxonomy (taxis, ancient Greek, order) is a classification system for defining sustainable business activities. The EU aims to determine a catalog of activities that should be consensually considered sustainable. Or to put it more generally, the taxonomy is intended to clearly determine for each economic activity whether it is sustainable.
The taxonomy thus also provides the basis for deciding what is politically promoted under this standard.
The EU has identified six ecological objectives. These are climate protection, adaptation to climate change, sustainable use of water and marine resources, transition to a circular economy, pollution prevention and ecosystem protection. For the first two goals, a group of experts has already worked out in concrete terms which activities may be considered taxonomy-compliant.
Companies must examine their portfolio and disclose the extent to which their activities are suitable for achieving these goals, or a percentage must be determined to which the activities are taxonomy-compliant. This then also offers financial market players the opportunity to report this key figure or to show the extent to which their portfolio meets the taxonomy‘s objective.
The EU taxonomy will thus provides standardization in the area of sustainable investment looking at the medium term.
As a company, we want to contribute to a more sustainable, resource-efficient economy with the aim of reducing the risks and impacts of climate change in particular. In addition to observing sustainability goals in our corporate organization itself, we also see it as our task to sensitize our customers to aspects of sustainability when structuring their business relationship with us. We are also a signatory to the UN Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI).
Ecological conditions, social upheavals and or poor corporate governance can have a negative impact on the value of our customers’ investments and assets in several ways. These so-called sustainability risks can have a direct impact on the net assets, financial position and results of operations and also on the reputation of the investments. As such risks cannot ultimately be completely ruled out, we have developed specific strategies for the financial services we offer in order to identify and limit sustainability risks.
To limit sustainability risks, we try to identify and, where possible, exclude investments in those companies that show an increased risk potential. With specific exclusion criteria, we see ourselves in a position to align investment decisions to environmental, social or corporate values. To this end, we generally make use of valuation methods recognized in the market.
One way of identifying suitable investments is to invest in investment funds whose investment policy is already equipped with a suitable and recognized sustainability filter to reduce sustainability risks. The identification of suitable investments to limit sustainability risks may also consist of our using recognized rating agencies for product selection in asset management. The specific details are derived from the individual agreements.
Our company’s strategies for incorporating sustainability risks are also incorporated into our internal organizational guidelines. Observance of these guidelines is decisive for the evaluation of our employees’ work performance and thus has a significant influence on future salary development. In this respect, the compensation policy is in line with our strategies for incorporating sustainability risks. (Art. 5 Disclosure Regulation).