On this episode we had an insightful conversation with Troy Mortimer, who is a Sustainability & Responsible Investment (SRI) expert and until very recently the UK Head of the SRI practice at KPMG. Troy has worked globally across multiple industries, primarily asset management, over the last 20 years. He has extensive knowledge and experience relating to governance and risk, due diligence, engagement, assurance reporting and responsible investment / ESG practices to sustainability related conversations at companies and with investors.
Some highlights:
- Institutional investors and regulators are starting to hold businesses up to a new bar.
- Savvy investors need to assess investments based on emerging risks.
- How to conduct a responsible investment due diligence.
- “I remember looking at one client's sustainability report that was over 500 pages, thinking, that's not an efficient way of getting information back into these key allocators of capital.”
- What really is a game changer is when an asset manager might push back in a constructive way on a client saying, “Here's why we think you would want to avoid this particular type of investment, or why there's a compelling argument to invest in this particular transition, or these best in class companies because of reason x, y, z.”
- Mark Carney said last week in in a speech that ... we can't isolate or self isolate from climate change”. So there's learning opportunities in this current situation that we really need to latch on to. Because there will be other challenges as we move ahead. And we need to make sure that we've taken those learning points and to adapt them because the situation will definitely be different”
- “My point with the SDGs, and frankly, with any kind of impact is that there's always going to be positive and negative impacts related to any investment. And where I found the true leaders in impacts methodology reporting, have held themselves out is to demonstrate that actually, they report both on the positive impacts as well as some of the negative impacts.”
- “There is good compelling argument for ESG, it has withstood a strong market shock. It benefits us all as humans on this planet, as members of society, and pastoral cares of this world that we're going to give on to our kids. This has led to introspection on what is our broader purpose as companies as individuals. The time of self-isolation has given us time to take stock of that.”
- Quality of investments will be key as we move out of the Covid-19 crisis.
- “If I had a call to action for asset owners, it would be to do your best to try to reward those companies that are making an effort to be transparent.”
- “The key thing is start to take action in your own way. have those conversations within your your respective companies, amongst your colleagues, inquire what's being done, look at what's going on within your own pension, and your own investment portfolio. But start to take small consistent movements, and be purposeful with it.”
Time Stamp:
[02:42] What is sustainable and impact investing?
[06:05] Troy’s career journey to date
[16:13] Importance of educating investors
[17:57] How asset owners have changed
[22:40] How well embedded is ESG in asset management
[28:37] Impact measurement framework, tools and responsible investment due diligence
[36:30] Top-down and bottom-up approaches to impact measurement
[40:00] Transparency and SDG
[45:00] Opportunities around Covid-19
[51:34] What inspires Troy
[57:05] What makes a Impact Leader for Troy
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