Covid-19 lessons for responsible finance?

Center for Disease Control (CDC) Director Rochelle Walensky believes that her agency is still unprepared for the next deadly pandemic, and emerging news about Monkeypox seem to give her...

18 August 2022

Institutions, Pandemic

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Master Class: Stakeholder Capitalism’s Next Frontier: Monopoly Power – with Denise Hearn

This second Preventable Surprises Master Class invited reflections on “Stakeholder Capitalism’s Next Frontier: Pro- or Anti-Monopoly?” – a new report co-authored by Economic Liberties’ Denise Hearn and Balanced Economy Project’s Michelle Meagher.  You...

10 May 2022

Positive Mavericks, Institutions, Reports

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Rubber, Meet Road

Face it: responsible investment is about political choices. Short of this reckoning, the fate of ESG might be the least of our concerns. What is ESG? It depends on...

4 May 2022

Human Rights, Positive Mavericks, Institutions, Climate disruption

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Is Corporate Political Spending Bad for Business? If So, What Can Be Done? A Conversation with Hon. Leo E. Strine

On April 6th 2022, Preventable Surprises was pleased to joined forces with the Erb Institute’s Corporate Political Responsibility Taskforce (CPRT), American Promise and In This Together, for a conversation...

30 April 2022

Positive Mavericks, Institutions, Corporate political capture

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Master Class: Life in the Early Anthropocene, with Howard Covington

Preventable Surprises Senior Adviser Howard Covington gifted us with an excellent first  Master Class on Life in the Early Anthropocene. We recommend you watch the replay or look at the slides. Howard...

31 January 2022

Human Rights, Positive Mavericks, Institutions

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Moving beyond Modern Portfolio Theory: 3 questions to Jon Lukomnik and Jim Hawley

Three Key Questions for Jon Lukomnik and Jim Hawley, authors of a really important new book, “Moving Beyond Modern Portfolio Theory: Investing That Matters”.  As you’ll see, this book...

29 April 2021

Positive Mavericks, Institutions, Forceful stewardship

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The 2020s: a decade for investor action to support more robust financial regulation?

This question was front and centre on our March 4, 2020 Corporate Lobbying Alignment Project (CLAP) online roundtable. The eighth in our series brought together speakers from international organizations,...

17 March 2021

Institutions, Corporate political capture

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Power, investors, and the steps of the US Capitol

In 2007, Citi then-CEO Chuck Prince famously said:  “When the music stops, in terms of liquidity, things will be complicated. But as long as the music is playing, you’ve...

7 January 2021

Institutions

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Q&A with Willem Schramade: a proposal for a financial system in transition

Finance In Transition, a newly published booklet by the Rotterdam School of Management at Erasmus University, is a proposal for a positive finance transition. With Business-As-Usual no longer an...

2 December 2020

Institutions

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Will the last institutional investor supporting democratic institutions turn out the lights?

We have been exploring explanations for investor silence about the US presidential election, both in the run-up and now in the difficult transition. The active corrosion of democratic...

23 November 2020

Institutions

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Responsible Investment needs a bigger toolbox

A survey of ESG influencers shows the elusive side of investor responsibility. What to do? When the Covid-19 crisis exploded in winter 2020, we spelled out four different...

17 June 2020

Institutions, Forceful stewardship

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“Act now. Don’t wait for the perfect plan.”

Three ESG questions to author (and Preventable Surprises Senior Advisor) Margaret Heffernan who just published a timely book,  Uncharted, on dealing with uncertainty. (1)    In your prior book, Wilful...

19 March 2020

Institutions

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Choices and scenarios for ESG in times of pandemic

Health experts recommend washing hands frequently as a protection from Covid-19. Investors should not wash their hands of the planet’s problems. The coronavirus pandemic is threatening lives, straining...

13 March 2020

Institutions

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Changing minds in the insurance industry: a conversation

Preventable Surprises invites perspectives from positive mavericks across economic sectors. Who are the agents of transformation? What do they think? Today, New Yorker Walter Murphy (WM) & Mumbaikar Praveen...

16 February 2020

Positive Mavericks, Institutions

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Inside Out Economics: Are Externalities the Main Event? (by Duncan Austin)

The question our sustainability crisis poses is whether our economy is more market failure than market. What says economics, then? The following is an edited excerpt from Pigou and the...

6 February 2020

Institutions, Publications

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Which financial sector players have most influence with the Bolsonaro government and Brazilian companies?

Belatedly, attention is focusing on the crisis in the Amazon and inevitably people are asking who are the financial sector players that have most influence with the Brazilian government...

7 August 2019

Institutions, Forceful stewardship, Biodiversity loss

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Greenwish: The Wishful Thinking Undermining the Ambition of Sustainable Business, by Duncan Austin

I’m pleased to post an original essay, Greenwish: The Wishful Thinking Undermining the Ambition of Sustainable Business, by Duncan Austin (available here). Duncan has been active in the sustainability...

22 July 2019

Institutions

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A new discussion note: The Climate Crisis, Sustainable Finance & “Made in Canada” solutions

The world has been struggling to come to terms with climate risk for several decades but as a result of procrastination, the risk is now systemic if not existential...

11 June 2019

Institutions, Climate disruption

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Goliath Asset Management vs. David Pension Fund

If you had to quickly pick which is the most powerful–sovereign countries, asset owners, or the investment firms both hire to manage their assets–who would get your vote? If...

3 November 2017

Institutions

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Ways of Being in a Brutalist Environment

The following speech was given by Preventable Surprises Board Member John Rogers on 6 June at the Responsible Investor Europe Conference in London. Today I’d like to talk about...

15 June 2017

Institutions

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Creating Sustainable Companies Summit

Frank Bold, a public interest law organisation with offices across Europe, is hosting a summit to focus on corporate governance and sustainability. Preventable Surprises CEO Raj Thamotheram will be among a panel...

6 September 2016

Institutions

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Country GDP vs. Investor Assets Under Management (AUM)

COUNTRY GDP (EUR bn) INVESTOR AUM (EUR bn) HQ Investor Type Japan 3,784 BlackRock 3,844 USA AM UK 2,426 Vanguard Asset Management 2,577 USA AM India 2,051 State...

18 January 2016

Institutions

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Long-Term Matters: Followers Will Make The Money Flow

“Investment is the most often repeated word in IMF meetings, UN meetings, [the] G20 meeting, IIF meetings,” Angel Gurria, secretary general of the OECD said at the organisation’s recent...

6 January 2016

Institutions

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Who are the 50 biggest institutional investors in the world?

Here’s a list of the top 50 institutional investors today.  Our thanks to IPE for the data. Did you know that 8 of the 10 biggest investors are fund managers headquartered...

24 November 2015

Institutions, Forceful stewardship

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Preventable Surprises welcomes the UNEP Inquiry into the Design of a Sustainable Financial System

The United Nations Environment Programme recently launched a report on its 2-year inquiry into sustainable finance. Its authors and contributors should be commended for the scope and breadth of...

16 November 2015

Institutions, Climate disruption

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Which investors count?

As society focuses on what investors can do to better manage systemic climate risk, the question emerges which investors have most influence. Slide 1 is a snap shot of...

5 August 2015

Institutions, Forceful stewardship

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The latest convert to long-termism is… the U.S. Chamber of Commerce!

It’s wonderful to read that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is forming a coalition to make sure “long-term value creation” drives the decisions of public company boards. What a...

6 July 2015

Institutions

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Financial reforms have treated symptoms, not causes, says former senior US govt adviser

“A lot of financial reforms have treated symptoms, not underlying causes” says Zoltan Pozsar at FT Camp Alphaville, a former senior advisor at the U.S. Treasury Department and now...

1 July 2015

Institutions

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Video: What can Investors do about the crisis in banking?

12 May 2013

Institutions

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