I had the opportunity this week to attend the book launch of Invest for Good by Mark Mobius, Carlos von Hardenberg and Greg Konieczny at Bloomsbury Publishing in London.  The authors are partners of Mobius Capital, a new IEN member organization, and the book focuses on ESG investing in emerging markets. 

 

The discussion focused on the opportunities and challenges of investing in emerging markets and the importance ESG factors in that context. Mobius shared that in many ways they’ve been looking at ESG factors for over 30 years in their investing.  This is something we often hear, sometimes in the context of undermining the importance of the ESG field (e.g. considering material ESG factors is just a repackaging of good fundamental analysis for marketing purposes).  But when asked about this — what was new about their approach if they’d be looking at ESG issues all along — Mobius shared that one difference is they are doing so in a much more systematic way now that their ESG process is explicit and more formal. Another difference is that in the past they were often looking at these issues from the perspective of how companies might be punished or fined if they had a pollution issue or worker safety issue — but now that there is more transparency and public awareness around these issues, ESG factors are even more important in reducing risk and uncovering opportunities to create value, as it relates to brand value, customer loyalty, public license to operate, etc. 

 

The talk (and the book) also focuses on the critical role of governance — both at the company level and in terms of national governments where they invest. Good governance is of course central to business performance and has a huge influence of social and environmental impact. They also discussed how improving governance at the company level can have positive impacts on government — helping to shine light on and reducing bribery, cronyism, nepotism, and other forms of corruption. 

We are very pleased to have Mobius Capital become an IEN member, and we look forward to their contributions to the conversations and educational activities in the Network.  And I’d highly recommend the book - and keep an eye out for information on the US launch in the coming months!