Robert Friedland on ESG Matters:
“But he added that buyers will also want to know that the copper or cobalt they are buying for their electric cars or lithium-ion batteries was mined responsibly. He said commodity prices in the future will likely vary according to ESG — environmental, social and governance — policies.
“There will be no one price for copper, there will be no more one price for gold,” he said. “Everything will be priced in relation to its ESG components.”
In managing ESG, you have to invest in technology and clean ones at that. Again, here we need young people to think outside the box,” Mark Bristow said.
Hambro stated that ESG and its impact on cost of capital was playing out at a rapid speed.
“The amount of money going in that direction is not necessarily a function of liquidity, but a fundamental shift in capital markets. People are investing from a different perspective and orientating capital to qualifying companies and securities through an ESG lens,” he explained.
Hambro added that complying companies were benefitting from demand for their securities and, as that demand continues to rise, the cost of capital declines. This while non-compliant companies will see higher cost of capital.
Moreover, Hambro said that, with the rise of companies trading at a discount owing to non-compliance to ESG elements, it creates opportunities for active investors to buy a company with quality assets and fundamental bases, but lack positive perceptions attached to ESG, which can have capital deployed into.