Event summary: Insight into Moral Money with Simon Mundy, Moral Money Editor of the Financial Times
Read on to find out how the team is comprised, what they look for in an email, the big stories for 2022, and more…
Moral Money:
- Gillian Tett, who is still in overall control, started Moral Money in 2019 after realising that ESG, which many journalists considered to be corporate fluff, will become a significant business story.
- Both the newsletter, which is sent on Wednesdays and Fridays, and the platform were set up to look under the hood of the sustainable business drive.
- The aim is to keep on top of key trends that are happening wherever they are in the world.
- The newsletter is part of the FT.com Premium offering, it is not a separate subscription. It serves as an acquisition mechanism for the FT.
- Moral Money is seen as one of the most successful new products the FT has launched.
- The team may publish articles that are pertinent to ESG and business written by other FT journalists on the platform.
- The difference between Moral Money and the main pages of the FT is its focus on how the flows of money influence the social and environmental impacts of climate change.
Team:
- The team is small and split between New York and the UK
- Gillian Tett: Editor-at-large
- Patrick Temple-West: Moral Money reporter
- Kristen Talman: Global audience engagement editor
- Tamami Shimizuishi: journalist covering Asia
- They all write for other parts of the paper too
- There is a strong tech/data team that provide data to help understand what is reaching audiences most effectively and what the readership want more of.
- Each of them has their strengths and areas of knowledge however they try to be general in their approach and write about a wide scope of topics
Audience
- Fast growing audience, particularly during COP26
- Moral Money is particularly strong in continental Europe, where sustainability policy is stronger than in other parts of the world
- Strong US/UK/Europe presence
PRs:
- The team receive a huge amount of emails from PRs and it is not physically possible to reply to everything, which does not mean to say that they do not want to receive them.
- Most useful: rigorous stories, useful research, anything surprising, contrarian points of view that people would not have thought of
- “Good reporters go out and get their own stories”
- Simon is keen to have face to face meetings and will travel abroad
- Charts that are surprising and relate to the news agenda are welcomed by the team
ESG coverage:
- Research topics by reading reports, news reports and around the subject. Speaking to people who are informed on the subject, whether that’s academic experts, research analysts or business professionals
- There has been a large emphasis on the E because it is easier to measure the environmental impact than the social impact of climate change. When you look in detail at the S, you start to think about tax policy, for example, rather than climate policy.
- The team are eager to report more on the social impact of climate change so stand by for more news and developments within that space
Impact of climate change on the UK:
- The physical impact of climate change on the UK will be less severe than in other parts of the world. There may be benefits, such as better agricultural conditions for wine production.
- Simon is most concerned about the impact on British politics. The Syrian civil war followed a drought and the wave of refugees drove the resurgence of the far right politicians.
- To reduce the impact, attention should be paid to the wider conversation about the agenda being driven by large companies because of a lack of government action.
2022 big stories:
- Social impact of climate change
- Green bonds
- Impact of companies actions on social justice
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