Shares of Capstone Rising
Shares of Capstone Turbine Corp (CPTC) are rising sharply this morning with high volume and gapped up with a gain of over 35% this morning. There is currently no news to cause this increase today and I will be digging deeper to find out what is going on. This is good news for the stock and also the portfolio. My holdings are now up over 50% in about 10 days. If you were thinking of buying the stock now, you should wait till some news confirms this move. Update at 12:15 EST: The only news I can...
Did You Just Buy a Sustainable Mutual Fund? No.
Garvin Jabusch Did you just buy a sustainable mutual fund? No. The answer is no because human economies are still so far from real sustainability that even a highly idealized portfolio of our most sustainable enterprises necessarily still falls short. Ultimately, the best any portfolio can do is mirror the reality of the world, and today, still, even the best representatives of sustainability can be found wanting compared to what will be required if we would like to keep society thriving indefinitely. At best, whatever fund you just bought can only be described as, to a greater or lesser...
Green Energy Mutual Funds Compared
UPDATE 3/4/2011: An up-to-date article on selecting green mutual funds and ETFs can be found here. Tom Konrad, Ph.D., CFA Most investors looking to get into clean energy think first of mutual funds. Here are the options, and how to choose. We track seven mutual funds with a focus on green energy and climate change at AltEnergyStocks.com, since the American Trust Alternatives Fund closed early this year. I split them into two categories: the funds with a primary focus on clean energy, and those with a primary focus on the environment. The clean energy funds are: the Firsthand...
Is the New Smart Grid ETF GRID All That Smart?
Tom Konrad, CFA First Trust Launched a Grid Infrastructure Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) on November 17th. Although the First Trust Nasdaq Clean Edge Smart Grid Infrastructure Index Fund (Nasdaq: GRID) is labeled a "Smart Grid" ETF to capture popular excitement around smart grid technology, it covers the whole grid infrastructure sector. This broader focus is good for clean energy investors. I've been an advocate of investing in electric transmission and smart gird stocks since early 2007, and for almost a year now, a regular reader has been telling me to create a transmission ETF so he can buy...
Green Mutual Funds and ETFs Show Signs of Life in 2015
By Harris Roen Alternative Energy Mutual Fund Recovering Alternative energy mutual funds are continuing to recover from a slump which started in fall 2014. Annual returns range greatly, though, from a high of 15.6% for Brown Advisory Sustainable Growth (BIAWX), to a low of -15.8% for Guinness Atkinson Alternative Energy (GAAEX). The large 12-month drop by GAAEX was precipitated by painful losses in some of its top weighted holdings… Alternative Energy ETFs Remain Volitile Green ETFs are showing a wide variety of returns, reflecting the volatility of the renewable energy sector....
Strong Returns Continue for Alternative Energy Mutual Funds and ETFs
By Harris Roen Alternative Energy Mutual Fund Returns Alternative energy mutual funds have posted extremely strong returns across the board. Gains have shown a wide breadth, with all MFs up for the last 12-month and 3-month periods. In the past year, all funds are up double digits. A new fund has been added to our tracking system, Calvert Green Bond A (CGAFX). This fund started trading in November 2013, and is the first green open end bond fund designed for retail investors. CGAFX focuses at least 80% of its assets on “…opportunities related to climate change...
A Clean Energy Inflection Point in 2013? The Best ETF to Play the Trend
Tom Konrad In 2007, it seemed like clean energy was finally becoming mainstream. Both candidates for the US Presidency accepted the need to act on global warming, even if they did not agree on the degree, and clean energy stocks were rising even faster than the broad stock market. Then came the 2008 financial crisis, and many Americans discovered they had much more immediate worries than the slow but inexorable warming of the planet. Fossil fuel interests and the politicians who benefited from their donations played to the new mood by providing a worried populace with the excuse they wanted...
Can Alternative Energy Mutual Funds and ETFs Continue to Beat the Market?
By Harris Roen Alternative Energy Mutual Fund Returns Alternative energy mutual funds have proven to be an excellent investment over the past year or more, but those gains have flattened out as of late. MFs are up 33% on average with even the lowest returning fund, Gabelli SRI Green AAA (SRIGX), up 15% for the year. The alternative energy sector is by far beating the overall market. For comparison, as of April 21 the tech heavy NASDAQ was up around 27% for 12 months, the S&P 500 by 20%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average...
Alt Energy Mutual Funds and ETFs Shine, But Risk Remains
By Harris Roen Mutual Funds (MFs) All of the alternative energy MFs were up handsomely in the past three months. The biggest gainer was Firsthand Alternative Energy (ALTEX), up 27.3% for the quarter, which also moved ahead in its ranking. Even the lowest three-month gainer, Brown Advisory Winslow Sustainability Fund (BAWAX), was up an impressive 9.2%. One-year returns were more variable, ranging from a gain of 18.0% for AWATX, to a loss of 11.7% for ALTEX. This has much to do with the solar holdings in these funds. For example, companies in ALTEX...
Renewable and Alternative Energy Mutual Funds Compared
If you can, you are better off in one of the clean energy ETFs, or even a portfolio of individual clean energy stocks (here are 10 clean energy picks for 2009.) However, it you want a mutual fund for the ease of investment, or you are looking to add one to a retirement plan, the Winslow Green Growth Fund comes out on top because of its emphasis on energy efficiency stocks (including these two Geothermal Heat Pump stocks), and its lower expenses.
Should “Green” Funds Invest in Fossil Fuels?
Marc Gunther Bill McKibben’s groundbreaking Rolling Stone story (Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math) and 350.org’s “Do the Math” divestment campaign raise important and difficult questions about fossil fuels. One that is starting to roil the world of socially-responsibly investing is this: How should mutual funds that strive to be “green” or “sustainable” or “socially responsible” deal with the fossil fuel companies in their portfolios? Should they divest, as McKibben argues? That was the topic of a column I wrote last week for the Guardian Sustainable Business, which generated some noteworthy responses. It’s part of the British newspaper...
List of Clean Energy and Alternative Energy Mutual Funds
Alternative energy and clean energy mutual funds are open-ended funds that invest primarily (at least 50% of the portfolio) in the securities of clean energy and alternative energy companies. Closed-end funds are included in the list of alternative energy and clean energy ETFs.
This list was last updated on 2/20/2021.
Allianz RCM Global EcoTrendsSM Fund (ADGLECO.TT)
Calvert Global Energy Solutions Fund Class A (CGAEX); Class C (CGACX)
Calvert Green Bond Fund (CGAFX)
Ecofin Global Renewables Infrastructure Fund (ECOIX)
Erste WWF Stock Environment CZK (AT0000A044X2.VI)
Eventide Multi-Asset Income (ETNMX)
Fidelity Select Environment and Alternative Energy Portfolio (FSLEX)
Firsthand Alternative Energy (ALTEX)
Gabelli ESG Fund Class AAA (SRIGX); class C (SRICX)
Guinness Atkinson Alternative Energy...
Alternative Energy Mutual Funds and ETFs Returns Flatten
By Harris Roen Alternative Energy Mutual Fund Returns Alternative energy mutual funds have given back some of the gains they have enjoyed since the beginning of the year, though they are still up almost 20% on average. All MFs are in positive territory, with annual returns ranging from 9.8% to 40.9%. MFs are also up nicely for the week and month, but on average are down slightly in the past three months. These returns are very different than those of just five months ago, when alternative energy MFs were doing almost twice as well… ...
A Better Way to Play Green Stocks?
Tom Konrad, Ph.D., CFA My Quick Clean Energy Tracking Portfolio continues to outperform all benchmarks and expectations... is it luck, or did I stumble onto a better way to invest in green energy stocks? I continue to be stunned at how the portfolio which I intended as an easy way to duplicate green energy mutual fund performance at much lower cost continues to blow those green mutual funds out of the water. I last published an update on this portfolio at the end of May, and was shocked to find that it had beaten the funds it was...
Screening For the Best Clean Energy ETF
by Vic Patel
There are over a dozen major Clean Energy ETFs available to investors. But which one is the best one to put your hard earned money into? Best can mean different things to different people based on their investment preferences and risk profile.
In this article, I will provide a more empirical based reason behind why I believe that PZD is the most attractive Clean Energy ETF at the moment. I have based on my analysis of 4 primary factors: liquidity, diversification, recent price action, and last but not least expense ratio.
Liquidity has to be a major consideration in the...
Choosing The Right Clean Energy Mutual Fund or ETF
Tom Konrad CFA If you want to invest in renewable energy and energy efficiency with just one fund, this is what you need to know. Over the last few months, I've written an extended series of articles looking at clean energy mutual funds and clean energy exchange traded funds (ETFs). Defining Clean Energy For my purposes, a clean energy fund is one that primarily invests in companies involved in renewable energy, energy efficiency and conservation, efficient and alternative fuel vehicles, and companies that are part of the supply chain for any of the above...
