At Putnam, sustainable equity investing is our approach to identifying investments whose performance can benefit from a firm's strategic sustainability focus. We believe that our tailored and forward-looking sustainability research has the potential to mitigate risks and to generate strong risk-adjusted returns, and to be a key contributor to long-term investment results.

By researching on a company-specific basis, our team can:

  • Gain greater insights about opportunities and risks for all companies
  • Identify sustainability leadership that could benefit long-term performance
  • Discover innovations that offer sustainable solutions

“Putnam's active management approach asks, where does sustainability excellence improve a company's business prospects?”

Katherine Collins, CFA, MTS Head of Sustainable Investing

Putnam’s equity materiality map | Focus on what matters

  • The investment relevance, or materiality, of specific ESG issues varies by sector, geography, asset class, and company context.
  • Putnam's internally developed materiality map, inspired by the work of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB), which is now part of the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB), illustrates how relevance of ESG issues can vary across sectors.
  • Our Sustainable Equity team extends this analysis to identify sustainability leadership in financially relevant areas.

Equity Materiality Map

We invite you to gather more information about what ESG investing means, our sustainable equity portfolios and holdings, and our team.

Frequently Asked Questions | Sustainable Investing

What is the definition of sustainable investing?

At Putnam, sustainable investing aims to identify companies whose long-term business prospects are enhanced by a focus on sustainability. We believe that companies with leading strategies to manage business-relevant sustainability issues have the chance to improve growth and returns and mitigate long-term risks, and that companies providing solutions to key sustainability challenges have the chance to create businesses with strong growth and returns.

What do sustainable and ESG investing have in common?

There are important connections between sustainability and ESG. At Putnam, ESG integration is the incorporation of business-relevant environmental, social, and governance analysis into our research processes. Our sustainable equity products aim to go “beyond ESG,” by identifying companies whose fundamental prospects are enhanced by demonstrating leadership or providing solutions to key sustainability issues. In all cases, our goal is to enhance understanding and to improve investment decision-making.

Sustainable Equity Investing: Our approach to sustainable equity investing incorporates fundamental research together with consideration of sustainable environmental, social, and economic development impact. We believe that companies whose products and services produce positive environmental, social, and economic development impact also often demonstrate potential for strong financial growth. In selecting each investment, we consider the extent to which a company's products or services may provide solutions to forward-looking sustainability needs, creating positive impact in environmental, social, and economic development areas. We believe that analysis of sustainability factors is best utilized in combination with a strong understanding of a company's fundamentals (including a company's industry, geography, and strategic position). Relevant issues vary by sector, geography, asset class, and specific company context. Therefore, we use fundamental research of ESG factors that is tailored to specific sectors, locations, asset classes, and companies. Our approach to sustainability analysis is deeply intertwined with the fundamental research process. We use company disclosures, non-governmental organization or government disclosures, public data sources, and independent third-party data as inputs into our analytical processes. In some cases, measurement of a company's environmental, social, or economic development impacts will align with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, and we will consider the metrics reported through this or a similar framework. Our investment approach aims to include fundamental analysis of product and service benefits regardless of the reporting mechanism. While we may consider independent third-party data as a part of our analytical process, we perform our own independent analysis of issuers and do not rely on third-party screens.