GLOBAL – The global voluntary quality standard for responsible investment (RI) research, formerly known as CSRR-QS, has been relaunched globally under the name ARISTA to raise its profile among responsible investment research groups and investors around the world.

ARISTA is the Responsible Investment Research Standard, developed in response to the demands from global investors and companies for RI research groups to incorporate quality, integrity, transparency and accountability into their research processes.

The new version of the voluntary quality standard – called ARISTA 3.0 – has a broader scope of certification and covers a much wider range of responsible investment services and products.

In particular, ARISTA addresses the key elements of quality, managing the environmental, social and governance (ESG) research supply chain, and overall research group performance – elements that are largely missing from existing codes in this field.

The standard uses a fully transparent methodology and calibrated and comparable assessment tools, each of which have been expanded to reflect the broader range of RI products now available.

François Passant, executive director of Eurosif, said: "Responsible investment research and ESG ratings have become an incontrovertible element of the responsible investment value chain. The launch of Arista 3.0 is therefore an essential initiative that will further foster quality and transparency in the sector.

"Further building on the previous version, ARISTA 3.0 enlarges the scope of its certification, which will continue to strengthen the recognition of the standard and provide an even stronger basis for comparability of offerings for users."

So far, 10 RI research groups from more than 15 countries have been certified against the ARISTA standard, including EIRIS, Vigeo, EthiFinance, imug, oekom research, GES, Ecodes, CAER, Greeneye and KOCSR, with Ecovalores and Inrate preparing to follow their example.

The standard is owned and managed by the Association for Responsible Investment Services (ARISE) and is responsible for organising the independent, external certification audits.

In other news, financial engineering company Active Asset Allocation (AAAiC) has been chosen by Cedrus Asset Management to actively manage the risk exposure to equity markets of Cedrus' first socially responsible investment fund of funds, aimed at the French institutional market.

Topics