[SOLVED] Sustainability in Asset Management
Sustainability in asset management including financial portfolio management Kindly dont miss the last paragraph which is important to note.This is a small project for a bank in Germany. It focuses on the two business areas of asset investment and commercial real estate interim financing. In asset investment, the bank focuses on long-term business relationships with high net worth individuals, institutional clients, foundations and other entities that need or want to delegate decision-making. No proprietary investment products are developed or offered. In addition, the Bank engages in proprietary securities trading for liquidity management purposes and, to a minor extent, for strategic capital investment.The bank has four target groups in asset management:1. professional investors and asset managers who do not require advice but appreciate the service and support of a private bank2. well-informed private investors who want to take advantage of short-term market opportunities and who are supported by the bank in doing so3. traditional private investors who pursue specific investment goals and receive individual support from the bank’semployees in this regard4. institutional clients, smaller pension funds, foundations, church districts and other institutions.For support in asset management, target customers should generally be able to provide the bank with free assets of between EUR 300 thousand and EUR 30,000 thousand.Background:The European Commission already published an action plan for a sustainable financial system in the first quarter of 2018, based on the goals from the Paris Climate Agreement and the United Nations’ Agenda 2030. The aim of the action plan is to align capital flows sustainably, to integrate the topic into the risk management steering cycle and to create more transparency for financial products.A central measure for achieving the goals is the consideration of sustainability in securities transactions and in securities (ancillary) services. This measure is intended to direct private money flows specifically into sustainable investments by taking into account the environmental (E – “Environment”), social (S – “Social”) and corporate governance (G – “Government”) factors.The proposals of the European Commission accompanying the measure, as well as the amendments of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), have implications for the conduct of business and organizational obligations under the Second European Financial Markets Directive (MiFID II). Of central importance in the legislative activities is the EU taxonomy. It defines what can be classified as sustainable economic activity in the future and is the core instrument of the EU action plan. In the coming months, further legal developments in the area of sustainability can be expected at national and European level.Student project assignment:In our opinion, sustainability is only promising within the framework of a strategic overall system, taking into account business and socio-ecological aspects. For this purpose, a systemic sustainability management is to be prepared and elaborated in the bank with regard to the overall bank management, governance, IT and business areas. The project assignment refers to the preparation and elaboration of the relevant and possible aspects for the integration of sustainability for asset management including financial portfolio management. This is to be done taking into account value chains and costs. It should be noted that sustainability issues are not to be considered one-dimensionally, but are to be provided with multi-dimensional levels. These possibly multiple conflicts of objectives must be processed transparently in order to submit recommendations for action to the bank’s management on this basis. In this context, it should be noted that our target group of institutional customers in particular is interested in suitable products for ethically sustainable investment.The following issues are of particular interest to us:I. Regulation1) What requirements, instruments, codes and voluntary commitments regarding sustainability exist for securities (ancillary) services for credit institutions?2) What are the minimum regulatory requirements that the bank must comply with in the future for securities (ancillary) services?3. what is the minimum amount of sustainability-related information that the bank must publish in the future?II. strategy1) What opportunities and risks do you see for us with regard to the following aspects?a) Customer needs (existing and new customers)b) Productsc) Pricing policy2. what strategic implications would you recommend to us with regard to the aspects mentioned in above?III Organization and pricing model(1) What organizational and/or technical requirements are necessary, e.g. for the sustainability assessment of investment products (sustainability ratings, ESG indicators), or do you consider them to be reasonable from acost perspective?2)What process-related effects do you see on the bank’s advisory and investment process?3) What could a future-oriented pricing model look like for our sustainability-conscious customers? (Keywords: flat-rate pricing, individual pricing, tiered pricing model).IV ESG Related CostsIs it worth investing in ESG? What is the profit of current investments on ESG companies,what are the costs of implementing it?IV. Personnel and corporate management1) What could a training concept for employees look like?2. which key performance indicators would you use for sales controlling?Important Note: We are a group of three who are responsible to submit this entire report to bank by next week. I am responsible to write a report / ppt on ESG related cost (Point IV) and future oriented pricing model (III. 3) part from the above. So I would like to assign this task for this two points only.
