Institutionalisation of Responsible Investment Practices in the Russian Federation

Nadezhda A. LVOVA, Oleg Yu. KORSHUNOV, Zokhid Yu. RAKHIMOV, Natalya S. VORONOVA and Ivan A. DARUSHIN

Saint Petersburg State University, Russia

Abstract

The paper concerns the issue of responsible investment as a separate fenomenon of the modern financial market. The research purpose is to show how responsible investment practices are institutionalised and adapted in Russia. The authors reveal the content and special features of responsible investment in relation with connected categories, such as ESG criteria, sustainable investment and sustainable finance, and discuss key institutional initiatives on the responsible investment market in the Russian Federation. These initiatives relate to the domestic principles of responsible investment and the national green taxonomy compared correspondingly with the UN PRI and the EU green taxonomy. The observed initiatives are rather similar to international analogues. Identified differences are not fundamental demonstrating not the adaptation to national characteristics but rather shortcomings. However, steps to institutionalize responsible investment practices contribute to sustainable finance development. Therefore, these positive changes shoud not be underestimated. The reported study was funded by RFBR according to the research project № 19-010-00526.

Keywords: Responsible Investment, ESG Criteria, Sustainable Investment, Sustainable Finance, Financial Market
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