Climate risk and sustainable investing

Abstract

While numerous empirical papers have investigated the volatility dynamics of Chinese clean energy equity markets, this is among the first studies to assess the impact of climate uncertainty on the risk levels of such assets. Given that China is extensively investing in green projects to achieve carbon neutrality, this strand of research offers important implications for investors and policymakers. Methodologically, we employ the GARCH-MIDAS model to examine the effect of the climate policy uncertainty (CPU) index on the volatility levels of the Chinese clean energy exchange-traded fund (ETF). We compare the effects of the CPU index with leading uncertainty indicators, including the crude oil volatility index, geopolitical risk, and technology sector volatility. The in-sample and out-of-sample analyses show that CPU has significant predictive contents for forecasting the volatility of renewable energy ETF and that the GARCH-MIDAS-CPU process outperforms other approaches. These results offer key implications for policymakers and socially responsible investors.