Hec center for impact finance research

Can a self-proclaimed Socially Responsible Fund (SRF) whose objective is to maximize assets under management improve social welfare? We study this question in a general equilibrium two-sector model incorporating financial intermediation, negative externalities due to firms’ emissions, and investors' social preferences, which are of two kinds: (a) private benefits from investing in low-emission footprint equities (``value alignment''), and (b) utility from causing improvement in social welfare (``impact''). We analyze the equilibrium size and strategies of the SRF. When investors with value-alignment preferences are in large proportion in the population we show that the SRF invests in the low-emission sector, while requiring invested companies to use low-emission suppliers. This ``Scope 3 strategy'' attracts both types of investors and indirectly induces lower emissions by acting on the supply-chain. In some other scenarios, the SRF adopts a dual-fund strategy that separates the two types of investors: One fund, focussed on the clean sector, caters to investors with value-alignment preferences, while another, which invests in the higher-emission sector, appeals to impact investors by imposing reduced direct emissions to invested companies.

By Augustin Landier and Stefano Lovo

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To the extent that firms don't internalise the negative externalities of their CO2 emissions, government intervention is needed to curb global warming. We study the equilibrium interaction between firms, which can invest in green technologies, and government, which can impose\emission caps but has limited commitment power. Two types of equilibria can arise: If firms anticipate caps, they invest in green technologies. These investments have positive spillover effects, lowering the aggregate cost of emission reductions for all firms, thus making the government willing to cap emissions. If firms anticipate no caps, they don't invest in green technologies, and the government finds it too costly to cap emissions. A large fund, engaging with firms' management to foster investment in green technologies, can tilt equilibrium towards emission caps.

By Bruno Biais and Augustin Landier

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Work in progess By Philipp Koenig, Vincent Maurin, and David Pothier

Work in progress By Bruno Biais, Johan Hombert, Daniel Schmidt

We provide the first analysis of the risk exposure and risk-adjusted performance of impact investing funds, private market funds with dual financial and social goals. We introduce a dataset of impact fund cash flows and exploit distortions in VC performance measures to characterize risk profiles. Impact funds have a lower market β than comparable private market strategies. Accounting for β, impact funds underperform the public market, though not necessarily more so than comparable strategies. We consider alternative pricing models, accounting for sustainability and emerging markets risk. We show investors’ wealth portfolios and taste change the perceived financial merit of impact investing.

By Jessica Jeffers,  Kelly Posenau and Tianshu Lyu.

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We investigate the expected consequences of negative ESG news on firms' future profits. After learning about negative ESG news, analysts significantly downgrade their forecasts at short and longer horizons. Negative ESG news affect forecasts more strongly at longer horizons than other types of negative corporate news. The negative revisions of earnings forecasts following negative ESG news reflect expectations of lower future sales (rather than higher future costs). Quantitatively, forecast revisions can explain most of the negative impacts of ESG news on firm value. Analysts are correct to revise forecasts downward following negative ESG news.

By François Derrien, Philipp Krueger, Augustin Landier and Tianhao Yao.

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We study how mutual funds respond to ESG scandals of portfolio companies. We find that, after experiencing an ESG scandal in their portfolio, active mutual fund managers (but not passive ones) are more likely to vote in favor of ESG proposals compared to other funds voting on the same proposal, and are more likely to reduce their stakes (and hence their voting power) in high-ESG risk stocks compared to other funds holding the same stock at the same time. Both results are pronounced (a) when the stake in the scandal stock is large, (b) when the scandal is less expected, and (c) when the scandal is accompanied by more negative stock returns. Our results suggest that scandal-shocked funds manage ESG risks in their portfolios, but fail to have much impact as exit undermines their engagement efforts precisely for those firms that have the biggest need for reform.

By Bastian von Beschwitz, Fatima Zahra Filali Adib, and Daniel Schmidt.

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We characterize investors’ moral preferences in a parsimonious experimental setting, where we auction stocks with various ethical features. We find strong evidence that investors seek to align their investments with their social values (“value alignment”), and find no evidence of behavior driven by the social impact of investment decisions (“impact-seeking preferences”). First, the willingness to pay for a stock is a linear function of corporate externalities, and is symmetric for positive or negative externalities. Second, whether charity transfers are contingent or independent on investors buying the auctioned stock does not affect their WTP. Our results are thus compatible with a utility model where non-pecuniary benefits of firms’ externalities only accrue through stock ownership, not through the actual impact of investment decisions. Finally, non-pecuniary preferences are linear and additive: willingness to pay for social externalities is proportional to the expected sum of charity transfers made by firms (even if some of these donations are negative).

By Jean-Francois Bonnefon, Augustin Landier, Parinitha Sastry and David Thesmar.

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Work in progress By Yurii Handziuk and Stefano Lovo

Using unique data on French firm-sponsored savings plans, we establish that there exists a significant negative relationship between firms’ ESG incidents and their employees’ investments in the company’s stock. Incidents in the “Social” category, especially those related to employee working conditions, exert the most substantial influence on these investment decisions. Conversely, incidents in the “Environment” and “Governance” categories exhibit no discernible impact. Pecuniary motives do not explain these findings. Overall, our results point to employees exhibiting parochial altruism, caring about their own interests and the interests of their colleagues within the company when making investment decisions in their company’s stock.

By Maxime Bonelli, Marie Briere and François Derrien.

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Work in progress By Michael Brown, Shawn Cole, Jessica Jeffers, Katherine Klein

In credit markets, screening algorithms aim to discriminate between good-type and bad-type borrowers. However, when doing so, they can also discriminate between individuals sharing a protected attribute (e.g. gender, age, racial origin) and the rest of the population. This can be unintentional and originate from the training dataset or from the model itself. We show how to formally test the algorithmic fairness of scoring models and how to identify the variables responsible for any lack of fairness. We then use these variables to optimize the fairness-performance trade-off. Our framework provides guidance on how algorithmic fairness can be monitored by lenders, controlled by their regulators, improved for the benefit of protected groups, while still maintaining a high level of forecasting accuracy.

By C. Hurlin, C. Pérignon and S. Saurin.

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By Stefano Lovo and Jacques Olivier