You can do well and do good. It will let you BE GOOD and BE WELL
FAFN- Schwab accounts will move to SAA-Schwab last week of February and I will not be able to access to your account from February 23rd - the 25th: if you anticipate needing funds during that time let me know ASAP: you will always have access to your accounts. Skye-Schwab accounts will move into SAA-Schwab by month end as well. 😊 Why does this matter to you? Hoping to complete Phase 1 and move onto risk tolerance and your Investment Policy Statement.
ESG Spotlight | Fifty years after Nobel laureate Milton Friedman famously declared that the sole “social responsibility of business is to increase its profits,” corporations are abandoning the dictum. “We’ve seen a demonstrable and well-articulated pivot of Corporate America in terms of how they’re aiming to please,” says Savita Subramanian, a strategist at Bank of America. “They’ve gone from shareholder to stakeholder returns. That’s huge.” Shareholders have been pushing companies to evolve, too. Money has flooded into sustainable funds: assets exceeded $17 trillion at the beginning of 2020, a third of the $51.4 trillion in U.S. assets under management.
Partner Profile | the face of financial advice just got brighter.
Julie Skye | Julie launched Skye Advisors in December 2017 when she combined her experience with her passion for Sustainable – Impact Investing and is co-founder of the Sustainable Advisors Alliance. Reach Julie at 918-408-7981: julie@sustainableadvisorsalliance.com
Krista Strohoffer | is co-founder of the Sustainable Advisors Alliance. She looks at the environmental, social and governance (ESG) records of a company as how a company treats its employees, its community, the environment, and consumers. Reach Krista at: 303.413.6025: krista@sustainableadvisorsalliance.com
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The foregoing content reflects the opinions of Sustainable Advisors Alliance LLC and is subject to change at any time without notice. Content provided herein is for informational purposes only and should not be used or construed as investment advice or a recommendation regarding the purchase or sale of any security. There is no guarantee that any statements, opinions, or forecasts provided herein will prove to be correct.
Past performance may not be indicative of future results. Indices are not available for direct investment. Any investor who attempts to mimic the performance of an index would incur fees and expenses which would reduce returns. Securities investing involves risk, including the potential for loss of principal. There is no assurance that any investment plan or strategy will be successful.
To create the Barron’s Ranking of the 100 Most sustainable Companies, the “grand-daddy” of Socially Responsible Investing, Calvert (now owned by Eaton Vance) took the 1,000 largest publicly traded companies and ranked each by how they performed for five key “stakeholders:” shareholders, employees, customers, community, and the planet. Most exciting to us now is that our planet and our communities are now considered to be stakeholders. Calvert looked at 230 ESG performance indicators, such as workplace diversity, data security, and greenhouse-gas emissions. They then assigned a score of 0 to 100 in each stakeholder category and created a weighted average of the categories for each company based on how financially material each category was. The Top 100 are outlined in the attached article…for those who want to know more about who made the grade in 2020. 😊 Why does this matter to you? The “Winners” of SRI are not just solar and alternative energy firms. It is NOT what you make…it is how you make it! Best Buy; Clorox; Williams-Sonoma; Verizon; American Water Works; Nike; Kimberly Clark; Levi Strauss and Colgate are just some of the names in the Top 100. Know it is here to stay!
What do the top 3 in Barron’s 100 Most Sustainable Companies have in common? For instance, # 1- rated Best Buy barred in-store shopping for six weeks, in favor of a curbside-delivery model; boosted workers’ pay early in the pandemic; instituted a $15 per hour minimum wage and granted paid sick leave. High-level executives took a 20% pay cut and used the savings to create an emergency fund for furloughed workers and by September, Best Buy had brought back half of its furloughed employees. Meanwhile, # 2 - ranked Agilent, which makes laboratory instruments and software, guaranteed jobs and protected base pay and #3 - ranked sanitation company Ecolab (hit hard by declines in its key customer base of hotels and restaurant) still protected the hourly pay of its employees. 😲Why does this matter to you? The Top Shops come from all industries: we can build portfolios with the diversification you need to manage volatility and risk to line up with your risk tolerance. Do good & do well!
So, what is a Bitcoin any way…and should you buy some? As a “cryptocurrency” it is a type of money that is completely virtual…think of it as an online version of cash…that some companies let you buy and sell with. While some countries have banned it altogether, PayPal, and last week, Elon Musk of Tesla, have stepped into the Bitcoin fray. If you are scratching your head about just what it is: here are some fun facts about Bitcoin:
· The physical Bitcoins you see in photos are a novelty…there is no actual Bitcoin. · They would be worthless without the private codes printed inside them. · Each Bitcoin is a computer file which is stored in a 'digital wallet' app on a smartphone or computer. · People can send Bitcoins (or part of one) to your digital wallet, and you can send Bitcoins to other people. · Every transaction is recorded in a public list called the blockchain, which makes it possible to trace the history and stop people from spending Bitcoins they do not own, making copies or undoing other transactions. · People set up powerful computers just to try and get Bitcoins, which is called mining. · It is becoming more and more difficult to stop too many Bitcoins being generated. · If you started mining now it could be years before you got a single Bitcoin. · You could end up spending more money on electricity for your computer than the Bitcoin would be worth.
😊Why does this matter to you? Are you feeling left out of the rocketing profits you keep hearing about? There are three main ways people get Bitcoins: you can buy Bitcoins using your own 'real' money: you sell things and let the buyer pay you with Bitcoins or they can be created using a computer. So, what do YOU think?