This fund has rather high exposure to ESG risk relative to its peers in the US Fixed Income category, earning it the lowest Morningstar Sustainability Rating of 1 globe. Funds with 4 or 5 globes tend to hold securities that are less exposed to ESG risk. Unlike impact, which focuses on generating positive environmental and societal outcomes, ESG risk measures the degree to which investments could be affected by material ESG issues, including climate change, biodiversity, product safety, community relations, data privacy and security, bribery and corruption, and corporate governance.
One potential issue for a sustainability-focused investor is that PGIM High Yield Fund doesn’t have an ESG-focused mandate. Funds with an ESG-focused mandate would have a higher probability to drive positive ESG outcomes. Currently, the fund has 25.4% involvement in fossil fuels, which is high in both absolute and relative terms. The fossil fuel involvement of funds in the same High Yield Bond category averages 15.1%. Companies are considered involved in fossil fuels if they derive at least 5% of their revenue from thermal coal, oil, and gas.
PGIM High Yield Fund has a 12-month asset-weighted Carbon Risk Score of 18.5. This is situated at the lower end of the medium carbon risk band, suggesting that its portfolio holdings are not among the worst-positioned to transition to a low-carbon economy, but they are not among the best-positioned either. Investors concerned about the transition risks may prefer to consider funds with negligible or low carbon risk. Such funds invest in companies that tend to operate in sectors less exposed to the transition (such as healthcare and IT) and/or companies in more carbon-intensive sectors (such as industrials and utilities) but that consider climate change in their business strategy and products, and therefore are positively aligned with the transition. The fund has a modest level of exposure (2.89%) to companies with high or severe controversies. Companies with controversies are involved in incidents such as corruption, employee abuses, and that pose some degree of business risks to the company. Severe and high controversies can have significant financial repercussions, ranging from legal penalties to consumer boycotts. In addition, they controversies can damage the reputation of both companies themselves and their shareholders.