Sustainable and ethical investment is a growing part of the market. Clients may have a range of motivations in considering sustainable and ethical investment, including purely financial ones. Whatever these are it is vital that advisers are in a position to fully meet their clients’ requirements.

Simple ways for advisers to get involved in Good Money Week:

1. Promote a free initial consultation or a ‘sustainable and ethical investment review’

2. Let your clients decide. Ask these questions in your next 3 client meetings: boost your Know Your Customer compliance and let your clients speak for themselves:

  • Would you like me to choose funds that exclude, say the tobacco or the arms industries?

  • Is it important to you that a fund manager checks whether underlying investee companies in the UK are complying with the UK’s Human Slavery Act 2015?

  • Would you like me to recommend funds that focus on companies addressing issues related to climate change, e.g. renewable energy?

3. Highlight your involvement

  • Use the Good Money Week Toolkit to highlight your support for Good Money Week.

  • Add a Good Money Week section to your newsletter or marketing materials.

4. Use your local media

  • Write a letter or article for your local paper

  • Contact your local paper and suggest they feature an article about sustainable investment and finance as part of Good Money Week

5. Join the Ethical Investment Association (EIA) 

 

Further your knowledge:

Read this speech from Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England

Read this from Carbon Tracker on why fossil fuel firms are set to waste $2 trillion

The Ethical Investment Association - an association of financial advisers dedicated to the promotion of sustainable and ethical investment.

The Ethical Fund Database from Ethical Screening 

sriServices Adviser support site, including Synaptic Software ethical fact find questionnaire

'Fund EcoMarket'  A free SRI & ethical investment database and fact find tool [from sriServices]  

30 People, 30 Words, 30 Years - a guide to ethical investing. A guide for financial advisers produced by PanaceaAdviser and sriServices.

Rayner Spencer Mills/sriServices ‘Adviser Guide to Sustainable and Responsible Investing’

Blue and Green Investor and The Guide to Sustainable Investment 2014

Some considerations which might be in the minds of your clients are covered in this blog by Julie Hutchison, Consumer Finance Expert at Standard Life.