Network for Sustainable Financial Markets » Blog

The Downside to America’s Fracking Frenzy

Charlotte — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 08:00:09 +0000

In a new report from the Globalist Research Center, NSFM supporter John Mathews explains how shale gas has been oversold as a way of breaking America’s dependence on foreign oil. What America should be doing, he writes, is focusing on renewables.

‘Henderson was a Canary in the Coalmine, Aviva is an Explosion in the SRI Business’ – by Hugh Wheelan

Charlotte — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 14:54:18 +0000

‘If asset managers are cutting SRI funds teams, will they really back ESG funds integration if the price signals aren’t strong?’

Hugh Wheelan, Managing Editor of Responsible Investor and NSFM supporter responds to recent events in the UK SRI industry:

http://www.responsible-investor.com/home/article/hen_aviva/P0/

John Fullerton on A Systems Approach to Financial Reform

Charlotte — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 08:00:09 +0000

NSFM supporter John Fullerton spoke on Thursday, 19th January at the Congressional Progressive Caucus Policy Summit in Baltimore on how work at Capital Institute might have relevance to the 2012 US Congress’s financial reform agenda.

Click here to read John’s hopes for how policy could shape the Future of Finance.

Hazel Henderson mentions NSFM in her review of ‘Greedy Bastards’ – Dylan Ratigan

Charlotte — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 08:00:20 +0000

In her review for Seeking Alpha, NSFM supporter Hazel Henderson writes:

‘Greedy Bastards (Simon and Schuster, NY 2012) describes Dylan Ratigan’s evolution as a financial analyst to a protagonist for fundamental reforms in six sectors of the US economy he sees as entrenched, obsolescent legacies from the past century. Since Ratigan has a huge following and many media friends , the book is already on the New York Times Bestseller List. Ratigan’s pugnacious title reflects his outrage at how vast sums of money, powerful special interest lobbies and subservient media have stolen much of US democracy.’

Read the full review here.

NSFM Supporter Michael Mainelli’s New Book – The Price of Fish: A New Approach to Wicked Economics and Better Decisions

Charlotte — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 13:46:46 +0000

The world is faced with a series of vicious and apparently insurmountable difficulties, chief among them unstable financial markets, rapidly diminishing resources and an eco-system that is becoming dangerously volatile.

While we like to think that economies, commercial organizations, agricultural and financial systems are “built to last”, creating stable, enduring value remains elusive. In The Price of Fishwe seek to examine, in a unique way, the world’s most abiding and wicked problems – sustainability, global warming, overfishing, overpopulation, the pensions crisis and excessive pay; all of which are characterized by a set of messy, circular, aggressive and peculiarly long-term problems. We suggest that it is not the circumstances of wicked problems that are too complex, but our way of reading them that is too simple. Too simple and often wrong.

A good example of a wicked problem is diminishing fish stocks; the price of fish cannot be right when there is over-fishing, hunger and ruined seas. Getting to the right price will require a blend of different answers, such as tradable quotas and certification standards for sustainability.

Looking to the models developed by quantum physicists like David Deutsch, author of The Fabric of Reality, we look to blend the four streams of any scenario –choice, economics, systems and evolution – a combination we believe is the key to finding new insights, making better decisions and, in turn, finding answers to the world’s most pernicious and long-term problems.

The Price of Fish: A New Approach To Wicked Economics and Better Decisions,Michael Mainelli and Ian Harris, Nicholas Brealey Publishing, 2011.