If you’re anything like me, you spent Easter weekend being barraged with adorable images of bunnies, lambs, chicks, kittens and puppies in your Facebook, Instagram and emails. And if you’re like me, this cuteness overload, interspersed with images of headless chocolate rabbits, put you in an especially animal-friendly frame of mind. I’ve given my cats an extra pet, set out birdseed for the backyard avian inhabitants, and, yes, reviewed my investment portfolio to determine how “cruelty-free” I really am.
While the environment and social investment causes like diversity and human rights tend to get the lion’s share of press, for the creature kind among us it doesn’t hurt to take a moment out of a post-Easter candy binge to think about how we can invest in a way that protects Peter Cottontail, Donald Duck and Foghorn Leghorn, not to mention Fido and Fluffy.
Perhaps surprisingly to some, making your portfolio (and your diet) a little more vegetarian can even help more marquee issues like the environment: Bill Gates revealed last year that while China leads the world in carbon dioxide emissions (10.2 gigatons), followed by the US (5.3 gigatons), the “Republic of Cattle” is a close third, at 5.0 gigatons. That’s right, if dairy and food cows had their own sovereign country they would be a leading polluter.
Yet unfortunately there are few ways make your portfolio a little more humane.
Individual equities
If you invest in individual equities, you can screen companies yourself using tools from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) or non-profit organization Cruelty Free Investing, which examines all publicly traded U.S. stocks and groups them into “good” and “bad” categories based on whether they produce vegan products (clothing and/or food), engage in animal experimentation, or breed animals for either use. Equities can be screened by name or based on stock-index provider (NYSE, Nasdaq COMP, +1.32% , S&P 500 SPX, +0.88% and more).
Cruelty Free Investing also tracks a list of the “Ten Worst Companies for Animals” that you can quickly check against your portfolio to weed out top animal offenders. Some of the companies named include household names like Tyson TSN, +2.20% Hormel HRL, -2.94% Smithfield Foods parent WH Group WHGLY, +5.28% 0288, -1.77% and Cal-Maine Foods CALM, +0.71% any one of which could have provided the eggs, ham or other staples of your Easter celebration.
Some of the firms on the list may be lesser known but even more objectionable to cruelty-free investors. For example, Charles River Laboratories CRL, +1.73% is the largest breeder of animals for experimentation, and Covance LH, +4.88% breeds dogs for animal trials.
Read: You spend more on your dog than on your cat because your dog lets you be in charge
Active fund management and mutual funds
While there aren’t dedicated vegan or cruelty-free mutual-fund options currently available, there are some investment vehicles available for those concerned about animal welfare. Unfortunately, the inaugural foray into “humane investing” launched by the Humane Society and Salomon Brothers, originally funded in 2000 with a mere $8 million, is defunct, but a few other funds have stepped into the void since then.
For example, the Parnassus Fund PARNX, +1.04% “considers ESG factors with respect to animal welfare, and prefers companies with positive indicators,” while Green Century US GCEQX, +0.83% International GCINX, +0.09% and Balanced GCBLX, +0.54% funds engage with companies to promote animal welfare. Still other firms, like Rocky Mountain Humane Investing and Macquarie Group MQG, +0.94% who acquired former cruelty-free fund provider Delaware Investments, can provide custom portfolios that promote animal welfare.
Indexes and exchange-traded funds
There is only one vegan investment index, and it is not yet investable. In June 2018, Beyond Fund Advisors created the US Vegan Climate Index as a way for investors to track the passive performance of U.S. large-cap stocks screened for “animal exploitation, defense, human rights abuses, fossil fuels extractions and energy production.” It was widely anticipated that an investable ETF would follow the launch of the index, and paperwork was filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission in September 2018. The projected January 2019 ETF launch has yet to be completed, and Beyond Fund Advisors didn’t immediately respond to a phone call or email requesting comment.
The lack of dedicated investment products in the cruelty-free space means that, at least for now, investors who wish to invest along humane lines may have to work a bit harder to do so. However, Beyond Meat BYND, +0.00% going public and even “Home of the Whopper” Burger King testing a meatless version of its signature sandwich this month, it seems reasonable to expect an uptick in investor demand. Until then, unfortunately, you are mostly on your own.
Read: The meatless Whopper is just the beginning — get ready for vegetarian tuna, steak and eggs
Meredith Jones is an alternative-investment consultant and author of “Women of The Street: Why Female Money Managers Generate Higher Returns (And How You Can Too)”. Follow her on Twitter @MJ_Meredith_J.
