Starting from the 26th October 2020, after the Conference titled “Presentation and application of guidelines for ethic and sustainable investments”, Nummus supports its clients analysing their portfolios and certifying them if compliant with the Italian Episcopal Conference guidelines.
As of today, a lot of funds have been analysed.
It is possible to download, in Excel format, the list of funds that already received Nummus.Info’s certification.
The MSCI World Select Catholic Principles ESG Universal and Environment Index is designed to mirror the performance of a strategy intended to selecting companies with a low exposure to carbon emissions and with a higher ESG performance compared to the market, leaving out companies involved in controversial businesses such as weapons, gambling, adult entertainment, environmental and social issues. Moreover, the index excludes companies related to abortion, contraceptive systems, animal testing, embryonal and foetal stem cells research.
Index Construction
The Index was created in 2020 by the partnership between MSCI, global leader in the index construction, and Nummus.info. It represents the transformation into factors of the Financial Resources Management guidelines designed by the Italian Episcopal Conference.
Thanks to the MSCI ESG Research methodology, the index identifies the companies demonstrating the ability of managing risks and opportunities linked to ESG factors, excluding the ones that will probably have to bear unexpected costs in the future related to a higher exposure to sustainability risks.
The index is built from the MSCI World Index with the application of different criteria to construct the ESG index.
The ESG screening used are:
The ESG investments performs better…
The MSCI World Select Catholic Principles ESG Universal and Environment Index overperforms both the benchmark global indexes (MSCI World Index and MSCI World ESG Leaders Index), being able to bring real advantage to the investment portfolio, both at the economic and social level.
Lyxor Asset Management, Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) European provider, decided to create an ETF replicating the MSCI World Select Catholic Principles ESG Universal and Environment index composition. On the 30th of September 2020, the ETF has been listed on Borsa Italiana and it is fully compliant with the Italian Episcopal Conference (IEC) guidelines.
Main characteristics:
This implies several advantages for the investor that can be summarized with the following:
3 September 2020 – The Italian Episcopal Conference has conveniently carried out an in-depth study and discussion path with a group of experts coming from different but related branch of knowledge (from theology to law, from pastoral to missionary, up to academics and financial experts) that have been participating since 2017 by the General Secretary of IEC on the topic “Ethical and Socially Responsible Investments”
This path brought to the approval by the Episcopal Commission (Episcopal Commission for Charity and Healthcare Services; Episcopal Commission for Social Issues and Work, Justice and Peace) of the investment’s guidelines “The Catholic Church and managing financial resources using the ethical criteria of social and environmental responsibility and good governance”. The document aims to be an invitation from the Church to continue the way towards transparency and information on economic activities. This is not only coherent with the evangelical principles but is a “due diligence” for who lives of charity or public funds, and it is even more important as responsibility in order to prevent bad management of economic goods.
Defining the “best practises” of investing, their inspirator, the objectives in investing activities according to ethical and sustainable principles, favouring the spread inside and outside of Catholic world, becomes then a great opportunity of Church testimony, in accordance with principles and values of truth, freedom, justice and solidarity. Every economic activity cannot be focused only on the production of revenue and profit but must respond to principles of environmental, social and governance sustainability (ecological, fair, and sustainable). The Church also believes that it is crucial to introduce a fourth principles: the ethic principle, coherent with their morals.
The document is a formation and orientation tool available to economic person in charge of dioceses, parishes, religious and charity foundation. It has to be seen as a mix of rules regarding the most common financial securities and investing choices. The characteristic of the target of the paper, institutional investors, doesn’t restrict the usage to the ecclesiastic world. In fact, it can be a support for private investors that find in the principles of the Catholic Church the way of investing, in compliance with the evangelic values.
In attachment the document “The Catholic Church and managing financial resources using the ethical criteria of social environmental responsibility and good governance”, edited by the Episcopal Commission for Charity and Healthcare and by the Episcopal Commission for Social Issues and Work, Justice and Peace. The publication (20th March 2020) was authorised by the Presidency of Italian Episcopal Conference.
It is the first handbook addressed to the Catholic world on sustainable and responsible finance themes (SRI), a very actual topic in Italy and in the world.
16 January 2020 – Today starts the distribution of the “Guide to sustainable finance for Catholic investors”. The volume represents the first example of handbook specifically addressed to Catholic investors, in order to support them in getting to know the sustainable, responsible and social caring finance world.
Today, this kind of finance is rapidly growing, both in Italy and in the world. It is estimated that in the world market the investments that follow ESG criteria account for more than 30 trillion dollars (30 thousand billion of dollars).
With the Church Social Doctrine in background, the guide, using an accessible register and favouring concreteness and convenience (68 pages divided into 4 chapters and 15 paragraphs and the appendixes), goes through the best practises adopted by religious investors, specific financial securities, the approach of religious investors to moral controversial sectors. It is highlighted the fundamental role that religious investors, in particular the Catholic ones, have been playing since the origin of SRI Finance.
In addition there is a specific focus on the international campaign for the disinvestment from fossil fuels (international investors with 12 trillion dollar of asset under management have joined this campaign) that has involved many Catholic Institution even in Italy (e.g. Caritas Italiana ,Il Sacro Convento di Assisi, l’Arcidiocesi di Palermo), following the Pope Francesco’s invitation contained in the encyclical “Laudato Si”.
Moreover, by several interviews, the paper offers the point of view of different eminent Catholic experts that have been working and sponsored SRI finance and impact investments for years.
The guide’s preface was edited by Eng. Livio Gualzeri, Financial Resources Management Responsible for Italian Episcopal Conference (IEC). The guide’s author are Alessandra Viscovi (Legal Responsible of Impact SIM, Scientific coordinator and professor in the “Master in Finance: instruments, markets and sustainability”, promoted by ALTIS-Cattolica), Chiara Tintori (political scientist and writer, member of “Consiglio direttivo di Filantropia Attiva Italiana”, former professor on environmental themes and collaborator of the magazine of Italian Jesuits “Aggiornamenti sociali”) e Andrea Di Turi (journalist, collaborator of “Avvenire”, one of the most followed Twitter’s influencer on sustainability themes, member of the faculty of the “Master in Finance: instruments, markets and sustainability”, promoted by ALTIS-Cattolica).
In the guide there are interviews to sr. Alessandra Smerilli, sr. Helen Alford, p. Augusto Zampini Davies, Claudio Kofler.
What does it mean to invest in a sustainable and responsible way? What are the most significant experiences to be inspired by? And why is the theme particularly relevant for the Catholic world? These questions, that can arise in who is facing these themes for the first time, find their answers in this guide, with a simple register and favouring concreteness and convenience. The sustainable finance world, in Italy and in the world, is booming and since the origin, the religious investors have been part of it. They still are, using sustainable finance as a tool to cope with the biggest challenge of humanity: the climate crisis.
“The guide is an up-to-date introduction and detailed tool about sustainability following ESG principles (Environmental, Social, Governance) in investing financial activities, addressed to believers and to Catholic world institutions that want to direct their activities towards those criteria. Through a synthetic chronicle of the phenomenon and the analysis of some relevant experiences supported by authoritative testaments, the reader is led to the awareness of the opportunity that the Church has today: testify coherence with evangelic values and, at the same time, demonstrate a good and faithful management of economic resources.” (from the preface by Livio Gualerzi, financial resources manager of Italian Episcopal Conference).