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The issue with one group withdrawing funding is that another group steps in to provide it. And they do so at a better rate for themselves. So the least ethical
by LatteLazy 6y ago
The issue with one group withdrawing funding is that another group steps in to provide it. And they do so at a better rate for themselves. So the least ethical market participant makes the most profit.
I prefer the opposite strategy some funds have taken: investing and then pressuring boards to behave better.
- adrianN 6y agoThe fewer people willing to lend the more expensive money becomes. This can make some projects unprofitable.
- LatteLazy 6y agoThe Problem is that is a long long way off. If you need to borrow 100m USD for a new coal power station, and the total world debt market is about $24tn, you're only borrowing something like 4x10^-5%. So even if 99.999% of lenders decline your project on ecological grounds, you still have 20 times more funding available than you need.
- toast0 6y agoIf there's more profit for the lender who stays, there's an dollar cost for the industry, which should reduce industry activity as projects are started/continued or not based on dollar cost and expected dollar revenues. This might not be the best way to increase dollar costs for the industry, but it is a way to do it.
- LatteLazy 6y agoIf capital costs go up 1%, that's a big boon for capital providers, especially in the days of zero interest rates. If capital costs go up one percent, that's a rounding error for the projects themselves...
- triceratops 6y agoThe fewer people there are that make money off fossil fuels, the less opposition there is to legislating fossil fuels. I think this is the right move.