Fang Fei, Parida Sitikantha
School of Management, Clark University, Worcester, MA, USA.
Int Rev Financ Anal. 2022 Nov;84:102387. doi: 10.1016/j.irfa.2022.102387. Epub 2022 Oct 14.
Sustainable investing has gained significant momentum over the past few years. In this paper, we study the performance and flows of sustainable equity mutual funds in recent years through the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that the high-sustainable funds perform better than the low-sustainable ones by between 1.32% and 6.96% annually. This outperformance significantly increases during the COVID-19 pandemic-induced market crash and the post-crash pandemic. Similarly, we find that high-sustainable funds attract significantly more investments (or suffer less outflow) than the low-sustainable funds by between 5.28% and 5.76% per annum. These flow differences increase considerably during the market crash, consistent with the 'flight-to-quality' effect. We also find that the high-sustainable funds attract significantly more investment during the post-crash pandemic than before the crash. This suggests that investors consider sustainable investing a necessity (not a luxury good), and their taste/attitude towards sustainable investing has changed - now they prioritize 'investing with a conscience.'
在过去几年中，可持续投资获得了显著的发展势头。在本文中，我们研究了近年来可持续股票共同基金在新冠疫情期间的表现和资金流向。我们发现，高可持续性基金的年表现比低可持续性基金高出1.32%至6.96%。在新冠疫情引发的市场崩溃期间以及崩溃后的疫情期间，这种优异表现显著增加。同样，我们发现，高可持续性基金每年吸引的投资显著多于（或资金流出少于）低可持续性基金，幅度在5.28%至5.76%之间。在市场崩溃期间，这些资金流差异大幅增加，这与“质量转移”效应一致。我们还发现，在崩溃后的疫情期间，高可持续性基金吸引的投资比崩溃前显著更多。这表明投资者将可持续投资视为一种必需品（而非奢侈品），并且他们对可持续投资的偏好/态度已经改变——现在他们将“凭良心投资”置于优先地位。
