Good Business: Vegan gold rush

Inside: Vegan investing is finally here, but might be a little confused. Bank of England presses insurers on climate. Big money starts to dump oil stocks. This basic carbon capture and storage technology has been around 400 million years. These countries will be first to face a water crisis. — Emily Chasan and Eric Roston Sustainable Finance: There's a gold rush for vegan investors as faux meat grabs the headlines and plant-based food is considered one of the best solutions to climate change. Beyond Meat's meteoric IPO gave public market investors one of their first real chances to hold shares of a vegan company. While shares tumbled last week after an unexpected secondary offering, the stock is still up about 600% this year. It seems like investor fans of a plant-based diet will have even more choices soon, as long as vegans also like tech stocks. A vegan ETF based on Beyond Advisors' Vegan Climate index, VEGAN, is expected to launch next month with a plan to avoid companies that profit from animal cruelty. But, it looks mostly like a large cap tech fund with big allocations to Microsoft and Apple and no shares of Beyond Meat, Bloomberg Intelligence analysts said. Meanwhile, this big technology-focused ETF made a $500,000 bet on Beyond Meat. The rapid mainstreaming of fake meat should grab even more investor attention this year. Beyond Meat and Hardee's announced a vegan sausage deal, while still-private rival Impossible Foods passed a hurdle to move into retail stores and is rolling out to Burger Kings nationwide. Solar stocks capped their biggest rally in four months last week, boosted by strong second-quarter earnings from SunPower and Enphase Energy. That was before Monday's market plunge largely wiped out those gains.   The hydrocarbon era is ending, and with it comes a loss of innocence, writes Bloomberg Opinion's Liam Denning. In the 1970s, we thought an energy crisis was caused by scarcity, but our actual energy crisis is born of abundance, he says.  The Bank of England asked British insurers to gauge how global warming might impact the value of the stocks and bonds they hold and if that will upend financial markets. It wants answers by the end of October. "The costs of ignoring climate change are rising," BOE Governor Mark Carney told Channel 4 News in the U.K. "The opportunity of doing something about it, those are rising. That's what the system does. It shifts money away from where it's costly, towards where it has opportunity."  The story behind Legal & General's decision to start divesting from oil and coal stocks highlightsgrowing concerns among big money investors that declines in crude demand will trigger an economic shakeout. The power industry's fears about how PG&E's bankruptcy would affect $42 billion of long-term electricity contracts are becoming reality. The utility sought to cut deals with solar and battery power providers to trim contract prices by about 10%, according to a court filing.  Green bond issuance has skyrocketed in the first half of 2019 to a record $124 billion, ending three consecutive half-year periods of declines, according to BloombergNEF.  Environment Mother Nature already built the world's best carbon capture and storage technology — a tree that grows like grass and absorbs 10 times more carbon than most other trees.  Climate change added as much as 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit to Europe's latest heatwave at the end of July.  If soft drink companies follow through with their commitments to increase use of recycled materials, 47 new PET recycling processing plants will be needed in Europe by 2030, a Wood Mackenzie analyst said. Though demand for plastic bottles may change in the meantime. San Francisco's airport said it will ban sales of plastic water bottles starting next month. Google said all customer shipments would be carbon neutral by 2020 and it will use more recycled materials in its devices. Wind turbines may be carbon-free, but they're not recyclable. As wind farms age and operators need to replace enormous fiberglass blades, they face a decision about sending used blades to landfills. The electric battery boom has a new target: ships.  Vegan ice cream is a hot commodity these days. But violent storms that have devastated farms in Southeast Asia are threatening to take away one of its best ingredients — coconuts. Diesel cars are hitting a dead end in Europe with two dozen cities planning to ban vehicles running on the fuel over the next decade. A French startup is already offering electric makeovers of old diesel cars for about $5,600. Germany's federal cabinet approved a package of electric car tax breaks July 31 with the aim of getting a million EVs on the road by 2022. In a green transport future, oil will need to fall below $20 to be competitive with battery-powered cars, according to BNP Paribas.  Social Nearly 1.8 billion people in 17 countries, or a quarter of the world's population, appear to be veering toward a water crisis. Europeans are now more worried about climate change than unemployment, the economy or terrorism.  Retail worker pay has hit a 15-year high, as minimum wage increases by states and stores including Walmart and Target jump-started income gains in a tight labor market. The industry still faces high worker turnover, however, which is hindering training to avoid active shooter situations in stores. As the Pacific laps up island nations, the U.S. will increasingly absorb both their citizens and the costs of resettling them.  Governance The capital behind the rise of China's tech firms is coming from the pension funds of U.S. teachers and firefighters.  Proxy adviser ISS launched its annual policy survey that will ask investors and companies about policies on climate risk, gender diversity, corporate boards and multi-class share structures through August 9.  BHP could quit the Minerals Council industry lobbying group over climate policy clashes, The Guardian reports.  California's deal with automakers over tailpipe emissions shows the growing importance of U.S. states in dictating carbon reduction policies, writes Ethan Zindler of Bloomberg NEF.  Note: Please send tips, suggestions and feedback to Emily Chasan at echasan1@bloomberg.net. New subscribers can sign up here. To see this on the web, click here. 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