Friday, December 21, 2007

Merrill Lynch launches carbon certificate

From Energy Risk:

Investment bank Merrill Lynch today launched an index-based investment certificate that offers protected exposure to the stocks of carbon efficient European companies.

The underlying index to the Capital Protected Carbon Leaders Europe Index Certificate is the first of its kind to provide exposure to carbon efficient stocks within various sectors, according to Merrill Lynch. It includes 60 equally-weighted stocks, which represent the top 10% of low carbon and low price-to-earnings ratio from combined scores.

The stock selection in the index is reviewed twice a year by a Merrill Lynch research committee.

“We believe that investing in Carbon Leaders is likely to be a win-win decision in the next few years,” says Zoe Knight, senior director of socially responsible investing, Merrill Lynch Research. “Investors will benefit from increasing money flows going into carbon-efficient companies while contributing to a cleaner environment at the same time.”