CEOs of top U.S. energy companies are speaking less about climate and carbon emissions, according to a Bloomberg analysis of quarterly conference calls held by 172 American oil and gas companies. The data showed how terms such as “climate change”, “energy transition” and “net zero” have been coming up with less frequency in recent conversations with analysts and investors. For instance, in fossil fuel suppliers’ conference calls this quarter, the use of language that alludes to environmental, social, and governance topics was down by more than 40% from peak levels in 2021. In fact, mentions of the terms “climate change,” “energy transition,” “emissions,” and “renewables” have all decreased. The analysis was based on an automated search of terms related to ESG issues in transcripts of quarterly earnings calls from publicly traded energy companies that hold calls in English. Prior to this year, energy companies were under pressure to slash greenhouse gas emissions, which led to a spike in discussions about ESG. But with fossil-fuel profits now soaring, ESG mentions have fallen, signaling that the industry’s focus on ESG might be fading.

Finsum:With fossil-fuel profits soaring, U.S. energy CEOs are speaking less and less about ESG.

According to the Wall Street Journal, investor home buying has fallen 30% over the past year due to high prices and rising interest rates. The Journal cited Redfin data that showed companies bought 66,000 homes across 40 markets in the third quarter of 2022, a 29% drop from the 94,000 homes bought during the same period last year. The declines come after a two-year period in which investors piled into the US housing market as the demand for suburban properties rose. While investors were buying one in every five homes at the start of the year, a combination of rising rates and elevated prices is driving the slowdown. The Federal Reserve tightened rates from near zero in March to a current range of 3.75% to 4%, which pushed mortgage rates higher and curbed demand. The interest rate hikes were in response to escalating inflation. In addition, house prices have remained the same in many areas of the market despite the fall in sales.

Finsum:Investor homebuying dropped 30% year over year due to a combination of rising rates and high home prices.

According to Bloomberg data, the iShares iBoxx $Investment Grade Corporate Bond ETF (LQD) saw $3 billion in outflows on Monday, its largest one-day outflow since the fund’s inception twenty years ago. The exodus was quite the reversal for LCD as the ETF saw six straight weeks of inflows. The fund was up 9% between October 20th and Friday, with investors pouring money back into credit with the hope that the Fed might slow down the pace of rate hikes. However, those hopes fell as St Louis Fed President James Bullard warned that “markets are underpricing the risk that the central bank will have to be more aggressive rather than less aggressive.” In response, LQD dropped 0.7% on Monday, its worst performance in over a month. As of Monday’s close, the ETF was down 19% for the year, its biggest loss ever. Peter Chatwell, head of global macro strategies trading at Mizuho International told Business Insider that “The fund’s recent rebound likely exacerbated the withdrawals as year-end approaches. Clearly, at this time of year, some money gets taken out of the market, particularly if performance has recently been strong, which with LQD it has.”

Finsum:LQD saw its largest one-day outflow ever as St Louis Fed President James Bullard warned that the Fed will need to become more aggressive, not less aggressive.

China has more than protests on its place these days; it’s also ratcheted up its standards on requirements for ESG disclosure, according to linkedin.com.

The country’s banking and insurance regulators sent its most powerful signal to date that supporting the green economy also should be on the plates of banks insurers. New guidelines were introduced by the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission making it incumbent upon on banking insurance entities to set forth strategies, processes and capacity to abet the transition to a sustainable future.

Typically, these measures change the duties of investors to blend ESG factors into investment decisions and stewardship and keep in mind beneficiary or client sustainability preferences. What’s more, they must report to their beneficiaries or clients.  

Since the growth of China’s ESG market works in conjunction with the development of the country’s green finance market, when it comes to ESG policy, it’s a no no to talk it over if the evolution of the country’s green finance policies aren’t kept in mind, according to sixthone.com.

Any luck, model portfolios aren’t especially attention adverse. It would help since they, along with technology upgrades and direct indexing increasingly are the cat’s meow among a growing battalion of advisor practices, a recent report found, reported pegasus-one.org.

And, hey, when it comes to model portfolios, take time to peruse the instructions. That’s because, the portfolios, when used the right way, can do a good job freeing up the time of advisory firms, allowing them to dig in more on other responsibilities, according to the findings of “The Cerulli Edge ― US Advisor Edition.”

Model portfolios should give advisors more time to devote to other advanced and financial planning capabilities, Cerulli said.

Among larger advisory firms, model portfolios probably will be adopted for small client accounts with assets on the lower end of the spectrum. That way, the report said, advisors will be able to focus on clients generating nose bleed level numbers. 

A strong catalyst for model portfolio adoption will emerge from the industry’s gradual segue in the direction of a financial planning oriented service, the report stated, according to napa-net.org.