SRI ETF = social responsible index exchange trade fund
I’m a total newbie looking for one world ETF for a 30 year investment to keep it simple and to reduce risk.
ETFs I’m considering are
MSCI World SRI Index (USD) https://www.msci.com/documents/10199/641712d5-6435-4b2d-9abb-84a53f6c00e4
MSCI World Climate Change ESG Select Index (EUR) https://www.msci.com/documents/10199/84e37acb-a91e-8ff3-a909-6f8c7c6306dd
most people I asked know about the SRI but not about the climate change one. climate change’s annual performance is way higher than SRI’s. Very unsure about how to proceed.
Just to be sure, annual performance is way more important than the cumulative index performance - net returns, right? Because here climate change is better than SRI.
If I’m US based, is it better to invest in a USD denominated ETF or does it simply don’t matter if I invest in a EUR denominated one (like climate change)?
How does trump play into all of this?
I looked into these so-called “responsible” indexes a few years back. It seems that whenever I dug into them, they invested in companies that didn’t seem to fit the description. These don’t change that assessment. You don’t have to look past the second page to see the primary holdings are not “socially responsible” companies at all.
SRI holdings:
NVIDIA
TESLA
HOME DEPOT
COCA COLA
ASML HLDG
NOVO NORDISK
INTUIT
DISNEY (WALT)
VERIZON COMMUNICATIONS
BOOKING HOLDINGS
Tesla? Come on. Coca Cola? Implicated in more environmental destruction than some oil companies, not to mention their irresponsible use of local water resources, including locking up a sole source of water away from local tribes and villages. Novo Nordisk? A socially responsible pharmaceutical company? Dream on. Intuit? They lobby to make the tax code impossible to understand without professional help, and also to ensure we can never file our taxes for free. Disney? Too many issues to list here. Verizon? Known for red-lining; being complicit in gov’t domestic surveillance; making empty promises to get gov’t subsidies, pocketing the money and not bothering to do the required work: stealing taxpayer money. All of the holdings are financial backers of Trump and the GOP, and most of them happily removed all mention of diversity or equality from their public facing materials to cozy up to this administration.
If you really want social responsibility in a stock, you’re going to have to do the research yourself and find individual stocks that meet your definition. Any day, one of those companies could change their direction, could be exposed as participating in activities you wouldn’t have expected, or simply be bought and or taken over by a non-scrupulous competitor or parent company.
Otherwise, you just have to accept that our money will be part of the problem, and sigh, hoping that your investments at least hold up long enough for you to retire, and hopefully you don’t feel too guilty.
I know we want to invest in funds that aren’t evil, but I’m not convinced that social responsibility and trading publicly are compatible. At the very least, of not likely you’ll find these kinds of finds are anything more than ugly companies packaging the same ugly stocks and trying to appeal to your conscience.
ETA: the climate change one is just as bad, full of Amazon, Google, Microsoft…
Edit2: just invest in the total market, a la Bogleheads, and spend the proceeds responsibly. That’s the best you can do. Social responsibility is defined by the individual.
Edit3: Consider a solar panel company. Green energy is good right? What if you find that they source their materials from a country known for human rights abuses, in the backs of exploited workers? Or they pollute? Or they simply post on ex-Twitter about their favorite fascist leaders? Does that change the SR value to you?