Royals Giving Ethical Investing Advice? Harry and Meghan Give It a Try

Two members of the British royal family — Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex — will be joining forces with fintech asset management firm Ethic to try to change people's investing habits and help people learn how to invest money in a sustainable way.

The royal couple joins as “impact partners,” hoping to bring awareness to modern issues, such as climate change, gender equity, and racial justice. Before the impact partnership announcement, Harry and Meghan were already investors in the company, allowing Ethic to manage some of their investments.

Ethic focuses on environmental, social, and corporate governance, or ESG, investing. It was founded by Johny Mair, Doug Scott, and Jay Lipman in 2015, and is located in New York City. The primary desire driving Ethic’s efforts is to bring sustainable investing to everyone. This is hoped to be accomplished by a team of technologists, quantitative analysts, data scientists, and designers working together to create sustainable equity portfolios for their investors.

And this message resonates with Harry and Meghan. “My husband has been saying for years, ‘Gosh, don’t you wish there was a place where if your values were aligned like this, you could put your money to that same sort of thing?” Meghan said during an exclusive interview with The New York Times.

They hope to draw attention to making deliberate investment decisions, including being more conscious when choosing companies in which to invest. The goal is to support companies that follow sustainable practices and also make sense to invest in. Following this strategy, you wouldn’t have to make profitable investments at the expense of your conscience.

Still, pairing a doing-the-right-thing attitude with savvy financial decisions doesn’t initially seem like anything more than a dream. This is because the financial investment world is typically all about making money at any cost. But with a company like Ethic, maybe personal values and savvy investing can meet in the middle and coexist.

If recent performance is anything to go by, things are looking good for Ethic. It tripled its assets under management in the past year while also having a very good boy, a dog called Byron, as its “Chief Smile Officer.”

Even though you may not be as rich as Harry and Meghan, you still have the opportunity to learn the millionaire lessons from some of the world’s wealthiest individuals. After all, every millionaire started somewhere, right? As you progress through your economic journey, consider the best investment apps as tools to aid you with important financial decisions.