“Sustainable Investing” and “ESG” are far more than temporary trends at the financial markets. They are essential to transform our global economy and get back into balance with our planet earth.

First you will learn the basics of sustainability and how politicians are trying to set a framework to enforce the sustainable transformation worldwide.

Afterwards we show you how the financial markets can influence the direction of economic development, and which are the current trends and problems.

After presenting the sustainable investing strategies, you will get to know a variety of criteria to identify sustainable companies on your own.

Through the combination of these sustainable criteria and the financial criteria of traditional value investing, you will be able to build a successful and sustainable portfolio.

This is what we call “Sustainable Value Investing”.

Practical application:

Create a theoretical ESG portfolio of at least five sustainable companies.

You can use negative screening to exclude certain industries right from the beginning.

For the remaining industries, the ESG criteria from chapter 5 will guide you to identify the most sustainable companies.

After verifying the ESG criteria for these companies, don’t forget to also conduct a financial analysis to see whether the selected companies are profitable, stable, and undervalued at the stock market.

If they don’t, you need to continue the ESG screening process and identify more companies.

Post your result in the project to inspire other students.