Slim pickings?_其他_趣味英语-查字典英语网

Slim pickings?

It’s a problem of definition. For efficiency’s sake, commentators like to lump all the ethical-style funds together. But inside the industry, there are apparent distinctions between ethical investing, representing the original purist approach; socially responsible investing, a kind of pro-active ethical investing less likely to have outright bans on companies; and sustainable investing, which is evolving into a pragmatic approach that seeks to “do the right thing” for long-term growth. Unfortunately, the distinctions don’t amount to much. Everyone, it seems, has a different definition; some players even define their principles on the run. As the Catholic theologian Germain Grisez warns, “While certain ethical investment vehicles are advertised as ‘socially responsible’, the notion of socially responsible here may not reflect a judgment conformed to Christian principles.”

Why has it come to this? Why can’t ethical funds apply a baseline test of “Christian principles”, or a similar, secular version of an ethical litmus test? The answer lies in the highly competitive nature of financial services: everyone wants to invest ethically, but nobody wants to lose money.

Last year, as resource stocks – which are often avoided, on environmental grounds, by ethical funds – drove the market higher, ethical funds failed to keep pace. The ratings agency Morningstar has said that mainstream funds gained 21.9%, while ethical funds rose by 18.89%. There’s the rub: 3% in lost profits. Over the longer term, the news is better. A swag of local and international studies show that ethical investments do not necessarily do better or worse than mainstream funds. In the vernacular of investment management, they are “cost-neutral”.