The coronavirus pandemic is one of the biggest and unprecedented seismic
shifts in the global economy that we’ve ever seen in modern history, and it’s
just getting started.
Already, economies around the world are shutting down. The federal reserve
has pumped trillions into the United States economy in just a matter of days.
Global supply chains have collapsed as entire Chinese industries went dark. And
this is just the first stage. We’re heading into a year’s
long recession that will have far-reaching consequences, some of which we
can predict with near certainty, and some of which will be entirely
unpredictable.
Of course, the global economic system has seen major shakeups before. The
timespan known as modern history, in official terms, begins with the onset of
the industrial revolution. The globalized market economy that we live in today
is all thanks to the revolution that started in Great Britain in the late 18th
century, which mechanized manufacturing and made mass production possible.
Likewise, in only slightly lesser terms, our current political economy wouldn’t
be what it is now without World Wars I and II, the Green Revolution, and the
invention of the internet.
So no, market shocks and economic recalibration are nothing new. But with
each passing year, the world’s economy becomes increasingly intertwined and
interdependent. Globalization grows stronger and more widespread all the time,
meaning that every economic shakeup anywhere on earth will only have more and
more far-reaching consequences as we move forward. The evidence is overwhelming.
For those of us that have grown up against the backdrop of the 2008
recession, Arab Spring, Occupy Wall Street, to name just a few economic
shakeups, crises, and movements, not to mention the looming omnipresent dread of
the existential hyperobject that is climate change, it seems that, in many ways,
the neoliberal economic trajectory that we are on has reached its limits and
dropped us off at the doorway to Armageddon.
Hyperbole? Maybe. But spend five minutes on the internet and you’ll see
that it’s a common sentiment.
In October of last year, protests, riots, and uprisings were fomenting and
blooming like so many fireworks across the globe. “In Lebanon they are against
a tax on WhatsApp and endemic corruption. In Chile, a hike in the metro fare and
rampant inequality. In Hong Kong, an extradition bill and creeping
authoritarianism. In Algeria, a fifth term for an ageing president and decades
of military rule,” the Guardian wrote
at the time. “The protests raging today and in the past months on the
streets of cities around the world have varying triggers. But the fuel is
familiar: stagnating middle classes, stifled democracy and the bone-deep
conviction that things can be different – even if the alternative is not
always clear.” And now? Well, a global pandemic certainly isn’t improving
the mood. And there’s likely more to come in the not so distant future.
Scientific American reports
that we can expect a lot more pandemics in our future, as urbanization, suburban
sprawl, deforestation, and overpopulation have worn down the spatial barriers
between humans and wild animals.
“We invade tropical forests and other wild landscapes, which harbor so many
species of animals and plants—and within those creatures, so many unknown
viruses,” David Quammen, author of Spillover: Animal Infections and the
Next Pandemic, wrote in the New York Times back
in January.
“I am not at all surprised about the coronavirus outbreak,” disease
ecologist Thomas Gillespie, associate professor in Emory University’s
Department of Environmental Sciences, told Scientific American. “The majority
of pathogens are still to be discovered. We are at the very tip of the iceberg.”
“We
made the coronavirus pandemic,” reads a New York Times headline from
January. “It may have started with a bat in a cave, but human activity set it
loose.” When logging, mining, drilling, shopping malls, and apartment
buildings have set us up for not just one apocalypse but an accelerating series
of worsening apocalypses, it’s time for change. And a new generation of
investors, innovators, scientists, and scholars, are ready for it.
The coronavirus crisis has paved the way for one of the biggest shifts in
capital reallocation that the world has ever seen. This new generation of
investors is working with an urgency never felt before, because they believe
that they’re the last line of defense to save the world.
Hyperbole? Probably not.
Look no further than the starry-eyed, revolutionary ideas of Elon Musk and
the wunderkinds of Silicon Valley, and then consider that these are the old guys.
Going forward, green energy, decarbonization, social justice, appropriate
governance, sustainability, resilience, climate-smart investment, and equal
rights won’t just be buzzwords, they will actually be on the corporate agenda.
Continuing to pour money into Big Oil and Big Pharma will no longer be
marketable.
Investors are already using their money as a voice for change. The ESG or
Environment, Sustainability, and Governance investment niche already has over
$30 trillion in assets under management. It’s now more than a trend. It’s
the future.
And a small Canadian company with big ambitions knows this all too well. Facedrive
is looking to take on some of the biggest names in transportation with a simple,
but important philosophy: “take something as simple as hailing a ride and turn
it into a collective force for change.” The company is actively taking control
of its place in this movement and helping shape a better world. More
importantly, it’s marketable. A key feature that has been missing from the
adoption of greener alternatives.
Facedrive is a local company bringing its values to the main stage. Its
message has traction. It’s already partnering with major international names
and capturing investor attention in a way that other companies dream they could.
This is not about politics. It’s about logic and a healthy dose of realism.
And that’s exactly what makes Facedrive
so genuine and accessible. Sure, business as usual has made a lot of money for a
lot of people and has driven incredible innovation and some of the best quality
of life in human history. Yes, an oil-powered industrial complex has paved the
way for modern medicine that have saved untold millions if not billions of
lives, food systems that have staved off widespread famine, and we now live with
the comforts of electricity, heat and air-conditioning, air travel, and
thousands of other nearly objective improvements to our daily lives. (In the
first world, that is.) But now we must reckon with the unintended externalities
of all of this economic growth. Our soil is degraded, our oceans are polluted
and acidifying, we’re losing biodiversity at a breakneck speed, and the earth
is getting warmer. Investors, if they are smart, will start investing in the
future, not in the cash cows of the past.
Few can attempt to deny that this is the direction that the global political
economy is heading. Consumers are savvier, the stakes are higher, and business
simply can’t go on as usual. It’s just a matter of time before a fossil-fuel
based economy peters out, whether we reach peak oil by exploiting the global
reserves or whether demand simply fades away as renewable energies become more
efficient and more cost-effective. Solar and wind power are already cheaper than
coal in most of the world, and they’re getting cheaper all the time.
Much of the developed world, with Canada, in particular, leading the charge,
are already taking major strides towards decarbonizing their energy industries.
Even cleaning up transportation with efforts like Toronto’s electric bus
initiative, or even local companies like Facedrive
making waves with greener solutions to some of our biggest challenges. And let’s
not discount the researchers around the world racing to improve green energies
and find a solution to unlock the solution to the green energy holy grail that
is nuclear fusion. These efforts are all finally starting to be taken seriously,
getting the attention, and maybe more importantly, the investments they need to
push their visions further by the day.
Heck, even Saudi Aramco had to admit that peak oil is due by midcentury in
documents shared as part of their initial public offering last year. Yes, to be
sure, their IPO was the biggest in history, and fossil fuels continue to make
big money for their investors--but for how much longer? And what of all those in
the middle and lower classes that are not only not reaping any significant
economic benefits from the current investment agenda, but are often actively
suffering from it, either directly by market squeezes and a widening wealth gap,
or indirectly by environmental and health externalities that the global poor
routinely bear the burden of.
Last year’s protesters in Chile, Hong Kong, Algeria, Iraq, Iran, and
Lebanon may not have known exactly what kind of change they wanted, but there
are people that do. And a good number of those people are the new class of
investors who give a damn.
Clean energy and climate-friendly technologies have long been bottlenecked
at the research and development level because there simply wasn’t enough
investment money. But that’s changing, and it’s changing rapidly. Some of
the deepest pockets in the world are diving into renewable energies in a way
that would have sounded like a fairy tale even five to ten years ago. The big
four of Silicon Valley and the tech industry as a whole have been pouring
money into the renewables sector.
Take Google (GOOGL), for example. Despite being one of the
largest companies on the planet, in many ways it has lived up to its original
“Don’t Be Evil” slogan. Not only is Google powering its data centers with
renewable energy, it is also on the cutting edge of innovation in the industry,
investing in new technology and green solutions to build a more sustainable
tomorrow. It’s bid to reduce its carbon footprint has been well received by
both younger and older investors. And as the need to slow down climate change
becomes increasingly dire, it’s easy to see why.
Social media giant Facebook (FB) is doing its part, as well.
Not only have they made dramatic progress towards their goal to run on 100%
renewable energy by the end of 2020, they’re working to build more
water-efficient data centers. In fact, their data centers use 80 percent less
water than typical data centers.
Not to be outdone, Apple (AAPL) has made significant moves
towards renewables, as well. All of Apple’s operations run on 100%
renewable energy. "We proved that 100 percent renewable is 100 percent
doable. All our facilities worldwide—including Apple offices, retail stores,
and data centers—are now powered entirely by clean energy. But this is just
the beginning of how we’re reducing greenhouse gas emissions that contribute
to climate change. We’re continuing to go further than most companies in
measuring our carbon footprint, including manufacturing and product use. And we’re
making great progress in those areas too," CEO Tim Cook explained.
Amazon (AMZN), for its part, is not carbon neutral quiet
yet, but it is making massive moves to clean up its act. It pledges to be fully
carbon neutral by 2040, and it is buying up 100,000 electric delivery vehicles
to get there. Not only that, it has built a 253 MW wind farm in Scurry County,
Texas, generating over one million megawatt hours of electricity annually.
Canadian companies are doing their part, as well.
Shopify Inc (TSX:SHOP) is a Canadian e-commerce company.
More than 500,000 companies rely on Shopify’s real-time e-commerce, including
Tesla, Budweiser and Red Bull, among many others. Shopify makes purchasing goods
and services easy for anyone – and in a time where convenience is king,
Shopify surely has staying power.
In addition to its revolutionary approach on e-commerce, Shopify is also
delving into blockchain technology, making it a promising pick for investors,
especially given that the sector is red hot right now.
BCE Inc. (TSX:BCE) is a Canadian giant. Founded in 1980, the
company, formally The Bell Telephone Company of Canada is composed of three
primary subsidiaries. Bell Wireless, Bell Wireline and Bell Media, however
throughout its push into the position of one of Canada’s top telco groups, it
has bought and sold a number of different firms.
BCE is also at the forefront of the Internet of Things movement in Canada.
Its Machine to Machine solutions are being used by numerous businesses
throughout North America and its new LTE-M network is sure to rapidly increase
the adoption of these solutions.
Power Financial Corp (TSX:PWF) has been in the finance
industry since 1984. The company operates in three segments: Lifeco, IGM and
Pargesa Holding SA (Pargesa). And, with its holdings in a diversified portfolio
spanning the United States and Europe, Power Financial is a leader in its field.
Focusing its investments in emerging industries, Power Financial stands to
benefit by riding this wave into the future. The company’s forward-thinking
attitude and liberal approach to technology is sure to leave investors
satisfied.
Shaw Communications Inc (TSE:SJR.B): Shaw Communications, a
giant in the Canadian telecoms sector, saw a drop in its share price following
its disappointing forecasted earnings growth in 2017. In a sector that is set to
see growth, undervalued and experienced companies such as this can make for a
great hold play.
Shaw owns a ton of infrastructure throughout Canada and its cloud services
and open-source projects look to address some of the biggest issues that its
customers might face before the customers even face them.
With a market cap of $13.73 billion, Shaw Communications is going to be a big
player in the sector for quite some time to come, and as it nears its 52-week
low this could be a great time to pick up a telecoms giant.
The Descartes Systems Group Inc. (TSX:DSG) (commonly
referred to as Descartes) is a Canadian multinational technology company
specializing in logistics software, supply chain management software, and
cloud-based services for logistics businesses. The company is making waves in
the tech industry with its futuristic products and visionary leadership.
Recently, Descartes announced that it has successfully deployed its advanced
capacity matching solution, Descartes MacroPoint Capacity Matching. The solution
provides greater visibility and transparency within their network of carriers
and brokers. This move could solidify the company as a key player in
transportation logistics which is essential in the world of a looming climate
crisis.
A greener future is not a political statement. Improving dirty business
practices is not bipartisan. No matter who you are and what you believe in, it
only makes sense to invest in the future. And there is no future without a
serious reallocation of capital. Don’t bother trying to fight it. The
investment revolution is now.
By. Michael Kern
**IMPORTANT! BY READING OUR CONTENT YOU EXPLICITLY AGREE TO THE FOLLOWING.
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Forward-Looking Statements
This publication contains forward-looking information which is subject to a
variety of risks and uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual
events or results to differ from those projected in the forward-looking
statements. Forward looking statements in this publication include that the
demand for ride sharing services will grow; that the demand for environmentally
conscientious ride sharing services companies in particular will grow; that
Facedrive can achieve its environmental goals without sacrificing profit; that
Facedrive plans to move to over 15 cities over the next 24 months; that
Facedrive will be able to fund its capital requirements in the near term and
long term; and that Facedrive will be able to carry out its business plan. These
forward-looking statements are subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties
and other factors that could cause actual events or results to differ materially
from those projected in the forward-looking information. Risks that could change
or prevent these statements from coming to fruition include changing
governmental laws and policies; the company’s ability to obtain and retain
necessary licensing in each geographical area in which it operates; the success
of the company’s expansion activities; the ability of the company to attract a
sufficient number of drivers to meet the demands of customer riders; the ability
of the company to attract drivers who have electric vehicles and hybrid cars;
the ability of the company to keep operating costs and customer charges
competitive with other ride-hailing companies; and the company’s ability to
continue agreements on affordable terms with existing or new tree planting
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