Private Banking: Demanding Times For ESG

Everybody wants a sustainable future, and people of means are increasingly eager to support it. “Sustainably invested” funds more than tripled globally between 2012-2020, to $45 trillion, says Wally Okby, strategic adviser on wealth management at consultant Aite-Novarica Group.

The Covid-19 pandemic should accelerate the trend, revealing new vulnerabilities for human civilization and forcing people to stay home and think about them. “Covid-19 made it clear that E [environmental] and G [governance] are important, but in crises, attention should be paid to social impact,” says Marianne Verhaar-Strijbos, a managing director in wealth management at Swiss private bank J. Safra Sarasin. She is referring to the modern holy trinity of so-called ESG investing.

Published by Craig Mellow in Global Finance.