Of course all things are related to a certain degree. But even then, my argument points in the opposite direction for investor activism. You need to own the stock to get influence.
On the other hand, destroying a company through regulation will hurt less if you don’t own that stock (or short it).
If an investor sells 10%, the let’s say in the absolute extreme case they drive the price to $1. Then I’d be happy to buy 10% of BRK at $1 and hold it and the price would recover afterwards.
More likely, Buffet would buy back stock cheaply way before it reaches $1.
I am afraid you are missing the absolutely phenomenal difference in scale and magnitude between mining, and everything else.
If you would like to learn about this topic, I can recommend conferences by Ms. Aurore Stephant, a mining engineer, geologist and NGO lead raising awareness about these issues.
There is evidence of large divestments impacting negatively the market value of polluting companies. Turns out, the largest stakeholder in the world is following this path.
I wonder whether we already reached peak ESG?
For some companies, the capital cost isn’t and issue as they are cash cows and can simply operate and even buyback shares at lower cost. Just look at the tobacco companies, you could have bought super cheaply and made huge capital gains on top of massive dividends.
It is more problematic for capital intensive companies, but there we see private capital stepping in.
In some industries, falling out of favour has coincided with massive underinvestment in productive assets, which I believe will lead to massive price increases and high profitability in the future.
I do not want to make money from killing people with tobacco.
Which is fair. Some don’t invest in alcohol, defence, mining and oil. I personally don’t invest in gambling stocks. But I am not of the belief that my non-investment has a positive impact.
Wouldn’t the right question be, by your initial argument, whether the stock price will recover to its initial price (and not whether it will go down to the arbitrary value of $1)?
Anyway, I tried my best to instill a bit of rigor into this discussion, but I think we’re reaching the limits of honest discourse and I will agree to disagree with the both of you.
Could you specify which mining are we talking about here? Coal mining, rare earth mining or something else? As i can imagine none of the electronics will work without metals/rare earth.
You would do good to not so easily dismiss the opinions of others as straw men and without rigor. Who knows, maybe you aren’t right?
Just remembered the thread when watching this.
Translation, 1:39
“I wanted stocks without child work and without weapon manufacturers. My consultant said now that is difficult, the only thing fabricated without child work are weapons. Because the kids play with it and decimate the work-force”…
Some of the sourced materials surely also include child work …
Edit: Hilarious video, btw, if you’re a German native speaker. I LOL’d a couple of times.
You’re in good company: Buffett also doesn’t invest in tobacco companies for I think the same reasons you cite.
While I admire Buffett, I’m more with @lindyman (on Twitter) on this: tobacco has been consumed by humans for over 12’000 years according to archeological findings1; it’s lindy.
And who am I to pass moral judgement on people who want to consume this substance or on people/companies who sell this?
YMMV, of course.
[1] Daron G. Duke, Alex N. Mackie, Michael R. Shane, Beverly W. Lepper, Thomas J. Bright, Benjamin J. Van Tassell & Richard N. Thwaits, “Earliest evidence for human use of tobacco in the Pleistocene Americas”, Nature Human Behaviour (October 2021).
“It costs a penny to make. Sell it for a dollar. It’s addictive. And there’s fantastic brand loyalty.” Warren Buffett before he became a cough scrupulous cough kindly old man.
Tobacco is great to consume 
The dark side in Goofy[𖤐] actually thinks that Buffett / BRK not investing in tobacco is just virtue signaling. Like some people drive EVs to message to the world … well, let me stop here. I don’t understand it, so I won’t comment on it.[
] But The Times They Are A-Changin’ 
[𖤐] Courtesy of Gemini AI image generation:
Our CEO maybe two years ago switched his perfectly fine, spotless and maaaybe three year old Range Rover for a BMW iX xDrive60 (expensive CHF 100k car in the version used by the CEO for an even more expensive car in the version used by the CEO for those not in the know about new car prices for premium brands). Main reason the CEO cited is that he can’t show up with a gas engine powered car in potential customers’ parking lot to sell our then newly branded ESG funds.[‡] Perhaps not even untrue.
‡ The allocation differences (weights relative to the benchmark index for the respective funds) changed by a couple of bips as a result of “applying” ESG to the corresponding funds. We basically changed the world. 
While I was bicycling down the Rhine river over the past few weeks, said CEO sent out an email to his team looking for inspiring replacement terms for “ESG” in our funds, citing unacceptable implications that are now associated for funds using the term “ESG”.
I was a little surprised as I thought this only happened in Texas and maybe other parts of the US, but apparently the anti-ESG wave has already reached European and even Swiss shores …
Personally, I am not unhappy as I have come to the conclusion that ESG is just a scam to extract more fees from investors with the net effect of exactly zero if not negative.
Anyway, I digress.
Maybe, though I am pretty sure Buffett would happily invest in some company using whale oil to boil the oceans to extract rare earths if it was “a company he understood” and “good value”. I like Buffett, I like BRK but I am not buying the kindly, folksy old sage persona. Nobody gets to be worth hundreds of bn without being a cosmically size schlong who’s screwed tens/hundreds of thousands of people on the way there. At least Munger didn’t hide what a terrible human being he was
I think what’s happening in any sort of Trumpland is people whose last remaining joy in this world is driving a tarded big pickup truck said “We had enough, screw your pandas, I wanna drav ma truck, 'murica fak yeah”. I personally actively avoid ESG funds.
Tobacco, similar to weapons, is often consumed involuntarily, which is the biggest problem. Strangely Switzerland is doing okay with weapons, but horribly with tobacco…
Why is tobacco bad in your opinion? Not trick question. I don’t smoke indoors or anywhere near my kids, or any other person. Why is tobacco bad?
It has a huge cost wrt to public health (at least cigarettes, maybe other forms of tobacco addiction mostly impact the individual and would be less problematic)
Buying a product that shortens your lifetime is not very mustachian, either!
Beyond personal health, tobacco use costs the global economy an estimated $1.4 trillion annually in healthcare expenses and lost productivity. ( Tobacco control | UICC)
I put fast food, tobacco and alcohol mostly the the same bucket. maybe tobacco further out due to the extremely addictive nature. But essentially, we choose to consume these things even if they are not that healthy for us.
Woah! Care to back this up?
Ditto (regarding backing up this statement)?
Not saying you can’t, just curious what studies are out there to back these views.
