Fresh figures show that exchange traded funds which play to an ESG investment theme boosted their assets last November.

There were $52.35 billion of assets invested in exchange traded funds which track indices driven by environmental, social and governance themes in November 2019, with that figure rising by 7.4 per cent from the previous month, industry figures showed.

The popularity of ESG investing shows few signs of waning, according to figures from ETFGI, an independent group tracking exchange traded funds. November’s figure is a record.

This publication has chronicled how wealth managers and clients have embraced ESG approaches to investing, using market forces to encourage changes such as cutting the use of fossil fuels, improving working conditions in developing countries and making firms more accountable to shareholders. The influx of money into ESG-themed investments has, however, prompted some commentators to warn about firms “greenwashing” their activity by talking about changes rather than making them.

Figures have shown that ESG-themed ETFs and exchange traded products listed globally gathered $2.66 billion in net new assets during November.

At the end of November 2019, the Global ETF/ETP industry had 269 ETFs/ETPs, with 753 listings, from 71 providers on 29 exchanges in 58 countries. 

ETFs and other index-based entities have boomed on the back of a decade of a bull market in equities, which combined with regulatory pressures and frustration over fees has blunted the appeal of more active approaches to managing money.