There’s never been a greater focus on the impact our investments have on the planet – and the influence that we wield as investors on the companies around us.
When it comes to measuring and managing the environmental impact of portfolios, equity holders often take most of the headlines. That's not surprising; shareholder resolutions are a powerful tool to shape business change, and the listed nature of the markets means data is more readily available and comparable.
But bonds are just as important – today many companies finance themselves substantially in the bond markets, returning regularly to raise money from fixed income investors. Many large investors, particularly UK DB pension schemes, are tilting their portfolios more toward bonds as they mature. These bond investors have a voice, and potentially a strong one if they vote with their wallet, on the way these companies are run.
Corporate bond portfolios typically run carbon intensity risk comparable to mainstream equity indexes. The question for us is, how can we set up more sustainable bond portfolios that work for our clients, and what are the trade-offs involved?
Investing in high-quality corporate bonds on a “buy and maintain” – rather than an active – basis makes sense. This has been our preferred approach for some time.
LCP clarity:
When it comes to responsible investing, equity investors get a lot of the headlines, but bond investors matter too.
LCP insight:
First, you’ll want to understand where you are starting from, then work with your manager(s) to establish guidelines. Reach out to our experts to hear more about how we’ve helped our clients.
The beauty of buy and maintain lies in its simplicity.
We ask managers to lend money to a range of investment-grade companies that they think will pay us back (with interest) over the long term. Don’t anchor to bond indices, just lend to companies with good credit characteristics. In doing this, we target a return over government bonds while providing certainty over future cashflows (so this portfolio can form part of any interest rate hedging programme for pension schemes). Clearly, it is not always as straightforward as it sounds – recent events provide an important reminder of the difficulties that companies can get into – but the aim is simple and eminently achievable for a good manager at low levels of fees.
These portfolios have a long investment time horizon: generally lending for 10, 20 years or longer. Given that, I see sustainability as a key consideration to manage the risks to your principal. Leaving ESG factors unmonitored can lead to exactly the kinds of issues we are aiming to avoid – tail risks which, if they materialise, can impact the viability and creditworthiness of a company during the holding period of the bond. A chaotic transition, new carbon tax, or investor activism could all affect a company’s bonds over a medium-term period.
In my experience, corporate bond managers do consider ESG risks. This is primarily done case-by-case alongside other financial risks as part of the fundamental credit analysis (on a ‘bottom-up’ basis).
In my view, it is reasonable to ask managers to do more to manage these risks and give some further direction in terms of how best to structure these portfolios (from the ‘top-down’).
Where can I start to do more to allow for ESG risks?
There are lots of levers investors can pull to adjust mandate guidelines and to target sustainability characteristics explicitly. In particular, metrics are increasingly available (and robust) which allow investors to increase portfolio resilience to climate transition risk.
As a fairly simple first step, you can instruct an explicit reduction in greenhouse gas emissions of the portfolio. The financial argument for doing this is to steer the portfolio away from companies most responsible for emitting greenhouse gases. Pressure on these companies is expected to come from various sources (including regulation, consumer behaviour and technology) as part of a coordinated global effort to decarbonise the economy.
Measuring greenhouse gas emissions of equities has become relatively commonplace. Many equity investors now manage their “carbon intensity” (i.e. tonnes of CO2 emissions per $m of sales). This is not as common in bonds as the data is not as readily available, but a good manager should be able to do it. We conducted research on over 50 portfolios which showed that a typical portfolio has a carbon intensity of around 190 t/$m, roughly comparable to an equity index such as the MSCI ACWI Index. The dispersion among mandates is very large, however, so understanding where you are starting from is a crucial first step.
Bond investors can start by setting targets for this metric. And our research shows that you need not pay a huge cost in reduced yield to do so. Perhaps as little as 0.05% pa to reduce carbon intensity risk by 30% or more, while maintaining other key metrics such as credit quality and diversification
The target reduction in greenhouse gases can be ratcheted up over time, with the objective of aligning to agreed long-term targets. Indeed, a number of asset managers have recently signed up to an initiative to work in partnership with asset owners on decarbonisation goals, consistent with the ambition to reach Net Zero emissions by 2050.
"We conducted research on over 50 portfolios which showed that a typical portfolio has a carbon intensity of around 190 t/$m, roughly comparable to an equity index such as the MSCI ACWI Index."
Jacob Stevens
Senior Consultant
What about more sophisticated approaches?
Towards the more sophisticated end of the spectrum is the forward-looking temperature alignment of investment portfolios. Some managers can assess the extent to which a portfolio is aligned with the Paris Agreement target to keep temperature increases well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels. This can even be used to guide portfolio construction to explicitly target a temperature-alignment trajectory.
Currently, climate metrics are better established and easier to codify than wider sustainability metrics – though there are (good and bad) ways to adjust portfolios looking at both. There are known limitations with some of the data available today and we expect the range of credible metrics will increase over time. The investment industry’s approach to sustainability is becoming more sophisticated and mainstream, and corporate sustainability reporting is also improving.
Conclusion
I don't see sustainable buy and maintain corporate bond strategies as a new asset class but as an important evolution in how mandates are structured to be more resilient to ESG risks.
If you are interested, the first step is to talk to your existing managers to understand where you are starting from, and what is possible. We would be happy to help you navigate this process.
Hear more from Claire Jones on the Investment Uncut Podcast series
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