This week is Good Money Week, which takes place every year to raise awareness of sustainable responsible and ethical finance, banking, savings and investment.

Pennine Wealth Solutions (PWS) are very passionate about sustainable investments and two years ago introduced the Positive Pennine Portfolios.

Too many funds are making statements claiming they are ethical or sustainable for marketing purposes, when in fact they are not, in what has been described as “greenwashing”

Sustainable Investments

At Pennine Wealth Solutions our Positive Pennine range of portfolios undergo a rigorous investment process, which means we look under the bonnet of the funds within our portfolios and how they are working towards the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

To do this, we use John Fleetwood from 3D Investing, who has been researching positive investing for over 25 years.  John measures a number of factors to assess the quality of a fund or a portfolio of funds.   This is reflected in an overall rating – the 3D Star Rating.

John’s scoring system is being used by many UK based investment houses, and it may well become the recognised UK wide measuring system. John was awarded the Sustainable Investment award in 2017 for Innovation, Research & Methodology by Investment Week for his work in this area. John provides the research to enable the Positive Pennine Portfolios to be created and continually developed.

In Sept 2017 PWS carried out a survey via 3 of their Independent Financial Adviser partners surveying over 160 investors. All investors had previously invested in general investments. None had indicated a wish to invest in sustainable investments to DO GOOD and AVOID HARM.

The results were eye-opening for the Financial Advisers, as it was clear from the finding of the survey that there was a genuine wish from investors to utilise sustainable investments. However, there was a definite lack of knowledge as to how to access these investment, showing the need for Financial Advisers to be educated on these types of investments.

In April 2018 PWS received the Good with Money, The Good Egg Mark which is designed to give people a way to identify those providers that voluntarily do more than their fair share for the environment and society, as well as customers. This is a great accolade to PWS with all the hard work we have been doing to educate Financial Advisers on positive investment solutions for their clients.

Please note that Pennine Wealth Solutions is only accessible via a Financial Adviser. To find out more about the range of Positive Pennine portfolios, please take a look at our website www.positivepennine.co.uk or call 0844 770 7721

Pennine Wealth Solutions LLP is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority