Welcome to the Sustainable Finance Guernsey podcast page.
Guernsey Finance is a joint government and industry initiative tasked with promoting and connecting Guernsey as a leading international finance centre.
Named as one of the Green Finance Guide's top 10 must-listen sustainable finance podcasts, our broadcasts feature news, insights and discussion about green and sustainable finance, and the contribution which Guernsey, as a global leader in green finance, is making in this space.
Brandon Ashplant (00:02)
Hello and welcome to the latest sustainable finance, Guernsey podcast rated one of the top 10 most useful sustainable finance podcasts by the green finance guide. Guernsey is one of the jurisdictions leading the way in green and sustainable finance. And as part of this podcast series, we will be speaking to and learning from some of the leading global figures in the field. My name is Brandon Ashplant, technical manager at Guernsey finance, the promotional agency for Guernsey's finance industry.
I'm delighted to be speaking to Cate Quentin, a partner and private wealth manager at Tribe Impact Capital. Kate predominantly works with high net worth individuals and the charitable and corporate sectors. Kate previously worked at Standard Bank Group where she managed the wealth of West African families and individuals and developed the Ghana business from inception.
With a background in international development and wealth management, Cate is committed to helping clients grow their wealth while also having a positive impact on the world. So without further ado, welcome Kate. Good to have you on.
Cate Quentin (01:08)
Thank you. Thank you, Brandon. Lovely to be here.
Brandon Ashplant (01:11)
So firstly, just for those who perhaps don't know all too much about you, can you just tell us a bit about your career to date and what you do now?
Cate Quentin (01:21)
Sure, yes. So, I mean, you slightly touched on it there, to be honest. I'm a sort of an accidental wealth manager, you might say, never having necessarily intended to be in this space. I started out my career actually looking to go into more sustainable development world, sustainable development world, and completed a masters in that many years ago at SOAS in London.
and spent quite a lot of time working abroad, largely in Africa actually, and spent some time working on maternal health projects in places like Malawi. The thing that kind of became clear to me, I guess, through that time was that there was something kind of fairly kind of unsatisfying about international development in that it was being done to an amazing level by the people working in that space, but was fairly misunderstood by
the vast majority of people in the world and really, really didn't feel like it was kind of doing much to make people's lives better actually, which is probably unfair because this is back in the day of the kind Millennium Development Goals and there were huge strides made, but not nearly kind of quickly enough, if you like. And the thing that kind of really struck me when I was in places like Malawi was that actually there were things that worked. You know, could be in the middle of nowhere in the middle of rural Malawi and, you know, it's impossible to get kind of
basic public services to people, but you'd go into a fairly small town or village and there'd be an ATM there and you'd have somebody like Standard Bank or Barclays or whoever it would be and they could actually issue cash to the local community. And I guess at the time it kind of got me thinking, I thought, if these large institutions can get cash to people in a place where actually a lot of people don't even have access to power or basic running water, that actually
if you could kind of harness the power of these organizations to do good and to help improve these people's lives, think what you could possibly achieve. And I suppose it sort of started me off on a journey of being quite interested in how money could really make things different. And that was money from the private sector versus kind of international development aid. So I sort of fairly quickly stopped working in particularly in the sort of aid sector and moved more into private sector development.
Again worked across Africa for a number of years in a number of consultancy roles, worked actually in those days with quite a few oil and gas firms and businesses that perhaps might surprise those people for somebody working in sustainability, and was always blown away actually by certainly the people within those organizations' willingness to think about the local community. And again, it drove forward this idea of what could be possible in a corporate situation.
And then eventually started working for Standard Bank and worked in wealth management for them, as you said, kind of covering West Africa. Absolutely loved that, spent very, very happy years on a plane flying around Africa and working with some amazing people who were really generating their wealth for the first time and thinking about how to reinvest it back into their countries.
you come up very face to face with environmental degradation, particularly when you're working in places like Nigeria, for example, you drive along the road and you can see layers of plastic literally etched into the earth in terms of building up a man-made earth mound of earth. And a lot of that comes from bad decisions that we've made in the West.
Brandon Ashplant (04:53)
you
Hmm.
Cate Quentin (05:06)
I suppose that all kind of came together and made me think I really needed to re-focus my efforts in terms of again thinking about this kind of sustainable development and how money can make that change, which led me to meeting some of the founding partners at Tribe and it really was a kind of marriage of those two worlds for me.
Brandon Ashplant (05:25)
that's an absolutely fascinating background. And particularly having been on the ground yourself and seeing it across the continent of Africa is, yeah, it's fascinating background. And you touched there on sort of how you came to Tribe Impact Capital and how that sort of, I guess, set the scene for the next question in a sense, which is, and I guess you have touched on it in many respects with regards to where you've come from and sort of your passion areas, but I suppose what sets you apart from other wealth managers, I guess, in short?
Cate Quentin (05:56)
Yeah, sure. So, Tribe was sort of set up with two aims really. It was to help people to feel more of a kind of connection to their wealth and their money. There was a sense, I think, from our founding partners that really wealth management had been done kind of in the same way for several hundred years. And it had sort of lost its ability to connect with the individuals at the end of their money. It was very much sort of formulaic, risk-
based kind of approach, which was all about kind of products really and sort of putting people into different buckets. And what we thought is that if you turn that on itself and understand who the client is that sits underneath that wealth and that money, you have a very, very different relationship and now it's a much kind of deeper and more honest relationship as a wealth manager with the end client. The second kind of challenge that we saw, and this was very much driven by Amy Clark, who's our chief impact officer.
was that the financial services industry was really kind of failing to understand how to measure the environmental and social impact of our investments. And it was something that was being talked about a lot and struggled with. And I think it still is really to this day. And think a lot of that comes from a certain level of ambiguity, but also a sense perhaps.
previously that finance people had to have the answers and actually sometimes you can't find the answers in financial services. So, Tribe is very much set up sort of to disrupt, if you like, to think a bit differently about that relationship to the client, but also kind of deliver a portfolio that meant more to the client than just financial returns. And interestingly, what that kind of brought together was something that, back in 2016, was kind of...
fairly unknown, but now it's talked about a little bit more, but it's around kind of this idea of values-based investing. So, you know, your values are something that are very personal to you. you know, Brandon, it would be wrong of me to assume that I knew you and what drives you. But actually, that's very important, both to kind of how your wealth is managed and what your money means to you, but also kind of your environmental and social impact in the world and how you think about that.
And so what we, I think what sets Tribe apart in answer to your question is that we kind of put the client at the centre. We talk to the client about things that are beyond their risk profile and their time horizon and all of those traditional things. And we do that because we think that that builds a better relationship with the client, but we also feel that that enables us to create truly kind of impactful portfolios and meaningful portfolios for the client.
Brandon Ashplant (08:44)
Interesting. you touched there on the of the client itself and actually the fact that the client is inherently sort of, I guess, at the centre of your business model. Can you tell us a bit about how you go about building a portfolio and sort of the process and the sort of routine behind that?
Cate Quentin (09:01)
Sure. So just as you've identified, the client is sort of central to our process. So what we built right at the beginning of the business actually is something called our Impact DNA process, which is a kind of combination, if you like, of sustainability and sustainable kind of ideas that we work alongside, but also quite a lot of kind of behavioural finance.
thinking as well, because, you know, just as we said, if you're talking to somebody about who they are and what makes them tick, you kind of have to understand kind of how that will lead to the decisions that they're likely to make in regards to their investments. So our impact DNA process is this lovely kind of and fairly kind of collaborative process that we sit down with individuals or families or even trustees, a group of trustees, for example.
And we get our clients to really think about A, what impact means to them. So is it something that is fairly localized to them? Do they think on a large macro global scale? And what are their thoughts around ambiguity around reporting? Do they like to see quantitative analysis, qualitative analysis, all of those kind of things?
And it's really interesting discussion because people tend to have thought about these things and have views. It's quite difficult, I think, to ask people kind of what impact means to them. And so what we've done is we've used the SDGs, so the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, and we ask clients to rank them, to put it simply actually, to just sort of tell us which of those goals really means most to them.
whether it's as an individual or as a group of individuals. And that really helps to guide us in terms of understanding, you know, is this a client that's really kind of concerned with, let's say, the environmental crisis, for example, or maybe they are particularly focused on education provision or gender equality, for example. And we start to just have a really nice and open conversation about those things and what means the most to the clients and why they've chosen them.
And what's really interesting about those is kind of twofold. So we haven't spoken about money, because you probably be aware of this, but often if you talk to people about money, people get a bit tense and we're very British about it and we tend to kind of clam up quite often. So we try not to talk about that much at all. So you can really kind of understand who the client is and what makes them tick. But we also kind of get a good sense of kind of really what...
the client thinks about outside of their wealth, really, which, you know, frankly is the best way to get to know someone usually. And it just, it leads to a really lovely conversation. And actually we've done that a lot with kind of multi-generational families. And you can imagine you sometimes have different opinions in terms of what really matters. you you just, it's a real pleasure as a wealth manager to sit in the room and see people kind of, I suppose, really kind of engaged and excited about the conversation.
Brandon Ashplant (12:12)
Thank
Cate Quentin (12:19)
So that impact DNA process kind of guides us, I suppose, in terms of what the client really wants to achieve with their portfolio. And then we translate that into something, which actually looks fairly traditional at the end of the day. We want this money to do well and to do good. So we want it to perform over a market cycle. So clients will get a fairly traditional kind of multi-asset portfolio.
The difference being that the portfolio will be kind of tailored to their impact characteristics. And that's because our investment and our impact teams who carry out all of the kind of management of the portfolios and the due diligence and everything like that, they will not approve businesses or investments that go into our portfolios that don't sit within our impact framework. So we have something called a twin lens approach at Tribe.
which means that we have an investment team and an impact team. They are equally weighted with analysts on both sides. And every single thing that goes into that portfolio has to be approved by both teams. Critically, they have a right of veto over one another. So, you know, we have rejected investments before because they perhaps were great impact plays, but didn't.
didn't sort of stand up when we looked at it from a financial perspective. Equally, the investment team had put things forward before that the impact team couldn't get comfortable with. But what you get is this really nice sort of positive tension, if you like, between that desire to really return on this capital over the long term, but also to align these portfolios with the clients. And so, that process goes on alongside the client process.
and the portfolios that we build kind of bring those two together, if you like. And then what we do is once we've kind of built it and delivered it to the client, we report on those things and relate it back to what the client said at the beginning. So for example, if you said to me that gender equality was your lead goal, we would build a portfolio that really aimed to deliver that alongside your financial aims. And then we would report back to the client on the activity.
and the progress that we were making as investment managers in relation to that specific goal.
Brandon Ashplant (14:48)
Okay. Interesting. So, I think I'm right in saying that tribe was set up in 2016. I suppose not long after the inception of the UN sort of sustainable development goals, the SDGs as we know them at present. and obviously you've talked around, actually how I guess tribe is informed in terms of what you do value wise and obviously that positive tension between sort of the financial trade off and the value side as well. But I guess,
It's always interesting to understand to what extent the SDGs perhaps have influenced organizations, philosophies and values. So from a tribe perspective, know, are these sort of, are they bedrock? Are they not? Where do these sort of sit in terms of the organization?
Cate Quentin (15:30)
They're central, actually, and really have been since our inception. Exactly as you say, we kind of, in 2016 when we were starting, the SDGs had been around about a year or so. They were ratified by sort of every country in the world, I think with the exception of North Korea. This was a really exciting commitment by the world to thinking about
what we can do to live within our planetary boundaries, but also to support our social foundations. So the goals are absolutely central. Much like we have as a business changed over eight years though, the goals probably have changed as well. you know, they are, I suppose, would they be the goals that I think the UN would set out today? Possibly not. But they still offer
some really exciting routes. These are not investment, this is not an investment proposition, but certainly these goals are the routes to living in a more sustainable world. And many of them offer exciting investment opportunities, if you like. So, as I've said already, we use the goals to help our clients to define what impact means to them. But we also use them when we think about what investments and businesses
are out there that are truly impactful. So, the way that we kind of define impact investing at Tribe is that we are looking for businesses that have products and services that are contributing towards the SDGs. So, a business that has what we define as 50 % or more of their revenue coming from products and services that are SDG aligned, that's kind of the truly impactful companies. And in fact,
lots of the companies in our portfolio will have closer to 80 or 90 % of their revenue focused on the SDGs. Where we've got to an interesting point, I suppose, and maybe we can touch on this slightly at some point, but around this idea around transitions. So a lot of your listeners will be aware that there's this debate around divestment and investment and putting your capital with the companies that are maybe less of an SDG.
SDG aligned, but looking to become more so. And we at Tribe certainly do perform, do support companies that are on a transitional pathway. But what we do is we'll look at kind of how meaningful that is, and kind of the pace at which the company wishes to transition. So, you know, there might be a company today that only has 20 % SDG revenue, but our analysts will look and say, right, in the next five years, they're going to be up at 80 or 90%.
that's exactly the kind of place that we can place our capital, support that transition and push that company harder to do it. So the SDGs are integral because they are still the best framework that we have for governments, individuals, businesses, really anyone to define what sustainable looks like. And I think, you know, we will see changes in that space probably over the next 10 to 15 years.
but that will only be hopefully just a kind of a development of the SDGs again. And, you know, there are certainly some spaces within the 17 goals that probably need to be turbocharged frankly at this stage, know, it's things like biodiversity loss and habitat loss. We know that that is a huge issue. You know, there may be more of a focus on sort of more of a focus on
renewable energy and the delivery of climate action. All of those kind of things probably need to be focused on a little bit more, but they are still absolutely integral to what we do.
Brandon Ashplant (19:30)
Intra, that's fascinating. I appreciate I'm going off script just with this next question. I hope you don't mind. but it's always interesting when you talk to, you know, managers like yourself and others that when, when it gets to the transition piece, actually for a long time, it was very unfashionable to sort of go down that route because actually it's a very difficult sell, isn't it? Because you've then sort of got to get involved with the perhaps sort of Brown assets or whatever you want to call them and sort of bring them into the light, so to speak, for a better analogy. So
Cate Quentin (19:35)
all.
Brandon Ashplant (19:57)
I guess my question is, how do you go about that? Do you sit down with potentials that are perhaps less interested but are worth having discussions with and try and convince them? Do you ever go down that route or do you go with those that are coming up and more interested in bringing their respective business model into that territory? How does that play off, generally speaking?
Cate Quentin (20:22)
We have an approach for both sides. So we will look at businesses that we feel are on a genuine transition pathway. And if we feel as an investment manager, as an asset manager, we can really help them on that journey, yes, there's certainly a place for that. I mean, this divestment investment debate is absolutely huge. I think one of the slight misnomers out there, perhaps in the marketplace, is that
there are some, and I won't name names, there are some very large businesses out there that make quite large claims about wanting to be on a transition pathway. But actually, certainly if I think of the oil and gas industry in the last couple of years have actually rode back on those intentions. And funny enough, you know, we as an asset manager looked at some of those businesses a few years ago and we're always very interested in if anyone makes any claims about wanting to.
transition entirely to renewable energy and we'll look at what that looks like. And actually it doesn't take long before you're digging down into the weeds to realize, okay, but, you know, sustainable revenue targets by 2030 are still way below where they would need to be to be a realistically transitioning company, for example. So we are always looking for those businesses that are meaningfully wanting to change and where we see a realistic timeline.
we will get involved and are happy to do so. So we will do that and there's definitely a place for it. I think sometimes some of the energy can be slightly misplaced. However, it is a really important part of investment. Our voice as an investor is just as important as the capital that we place. The other side of things is that actually the businesses that we do invest in still need help.
So to give you an example, we invested in a large wind turbine manufacturing firm that is obviously doing amazing things. It's creating a supply chain for the renewable energy sector. But we had some concerns about their biodiversity commitments, which is something that the business hadn't ever considered before. And so we've worked with them to develop a biodiversity policy and get it in place. And it's now being externally audited. So even the companies that are
you know, green or sustainable, they still need to be stewarded and engaged with to help them to kind of move further forward and I suppose keep their competitive advantage in this space. So our divestment policy, sorry, our engagement policy rather is led by sort of intentionality, if you like. So how intentional, how willing is this business to really change? And
then the second part of it is how much will our voice be heard? you know, as a business tribe, as one asset manager, are we really going to be able to knock on the door of a blue chip tech business, for example, and really make meaningful change? Probably less so than we are with a mid cap UK real estate business, for example.
where we have great access to the executive and the senior leadership team, and there is a true willingness to transition. And so I think as an investor, it's a mix of looking at the business and the underlying, seeing how realistic they are, but then also seeing where you can really make a voice heard as well.
Brandon Ashplant (24:04)
And I guess sort of returning to sort of your client base, is, bluntly speaking, I suppose, how is it different from more traditional asset managers? I know that in your early, sorry, your yearly sustainable reports, which is an interesting read, highlights that 50 % of your client base are women. yeah, just sort of that as an example, I just wonder why...
Perhaps you think that might be against sort of your competitors.
Cate Quentin (24:34)
It's a really interesting question. We didn't set this out to achieve this. It's one of those amazing coincidences that's come with the business that we've set up. I think, if I'm honest, female wealth holders and perhaps younger wealth holders as well, those who are inheriting wealth, particularly, or are younger, for example,
I think they place a lot more value in this idea of the relationship with the money. So if I could think particularly about female wealth holders, my observation is that women feel much more closely connected with wealth and they tend to be driven more by how they feel about the money and how they feel about their relationship with it. So you have a very, very different discussion.
And I think, to be honest, we have those conversations. We've brought on female clients, and then we've created a safer space for female clients. Because I think the other thing is that, you know, prospective female clients come to our events and see that we are over 50 % female and slightly different kind of dynamic, perhaps, and maybe more traditional wealth managers, there's also a sense of sort of feeling comfortable and safe.
So I think there's an element there. It's not to say that we don't have lots of amazing male clients who are incredibly kind of keen on impact and feeling closer to their wealth, but we certainly have, for whatever reason, think taking the financial questions out of the conversation, focusing on the individuals, I think that naturally appeals to a lot of female clients. On the kind of
multi-generational wealth as well. A lot of our clients are multi-generational. So we actually do look after, you know, generation one, the grandparents, the parents, whatever. But one of the things that is very common to our client base is we're often brought forward by a younger generation. And I think that's because, you know, these days younger generation can be, you know, somebody in their early 40s. But I think it is, you know, so many people in the world now are so conscious of our position in the world.
and really the existential threats that we're facing, that it's very, very hard now, I think, to think about money and not think about what that money's doing. You only have to look at the tragic floods in Valencia recently or the ongoing issues around the world and see the effects that climate change is having on people living in Europe not far away. It's absolutely horrendous.
And I think if you have inherited wealth and you see your role as stewarding that wealth, I think that it's particularly important then to think about kind of what good that money could do. So yes, not something we set out to do at all, but it's a real pleasure actually to work with. I said we have a kind of predominantly female client base. As I say, we have lots of younger clients and it is very different. I would say as well though that,
The interesting thing for me is that we also have quite a lot of traditional investors. So one of the things that we're seeing increasingly is we get lots of people approaching us as a firm who say, look, you're so different from other wealth managers. Our approach and our universe is so different that actually we have quite a lot of quite finance-focused clients now who see the kind of impact approach as a kind of correlation play, if you like. So it's fairly uncorrelated to their traditional wealth manager as well.
Brandon Ashplant (28:23)
Okay.
Cate Quentin (28:28)
So I think it works on lots of different levels. I suppose the only other part that I would say that's been a real kind of joy for me as a wealth manager, and this is less to do with the sustainability, but more to do with the organization, is that we are a B corporation as a business, and certainly kind of tribe itself, it's actually written into our men and arts as a business, that we have a kind of wider commitment to our stakeholders and that sort of people and planet.
And that culture is really felt right through the business, all through the people that work here. And I think it enables us, from the sort of right down to quite deliberate decisions not to be based in the city of London, for example, just to kind of try and free ourselves and think of it differently as wealth managers. And I think that really appeals to clients. I think when clients can walk in and see a wealth manager that they can relate to.
It's an incredibly powerful thing. And I think increasingly, I see other wealth management firms, whether they're doing impact or not, they're starting to think about becoming a little bit more human, if you like. And if you remember, go right back to the two kind of reasons Tribe was set up. Yes, it was about the impact, but it was also to change slightly how wealth management was done. And I think that's been a big part of our success with different types of clients.
Brandon Ashplant (29:53)
Yeah. We've spoken on this channel previously with other guests about the evolution of client needs over time. obviously as a sort of green slash sort of sustainable finance channel, you know, we're increasingly interested or were founded and increasingly so interested on sort of these priorities shifting towards sort of social impact and sort of the S and the G as well as the E. And I wanted to just from your side, that sentiment and that sense of, I guess, driving towards that, you know, that green zone, if you like, in a sense.
Is that something you see sort of exponentially increasing across, you know, industry, and across the world as well, or is that perhaps more of a phenomenon that we just see with younger clients or perhaps female clients? know, what's the sort of analysis from your end across, I guess, the wider, the wider world.
Cate Quentin (30:44)
I think our main thesis is that you only really need to look at the fact that we're living in about 1.6 times our Earth's capacity already. We're on borrowed time. And as I said before, we're living with the results of that every day from a climate perspective and growing difficulties from a social perspective. People recognize that, and people recognize that there is an issue out there.
But the other point is that often from these challenges rise opportunities. And so again, going back to our kind of central investment thesis, where do you want your money to be for the next 10, 20, 30 years? It's in the businesses that are solving these issues. And so I don't see really that this is changing. In some ways, I would love to take the sustainable label away because I think this is really just good investing. And I'm
Brandon Ashplant (31:40)
Mm.
Cate Quentin (31:43)
I think we're all probably aware that the kind of ESG, sustainability space and those terms have been pretty badly politicized over the last couple of years. And in some ways, it'd be quite nice to take them away because actually what I think we're doing is just we're just building very well risk adjusted portfolios for the long term. And so I don't see that changing, actually. I think when we started eight years ago, not many people were doing this.
over the eight years, I would say most banks now have sustainability offerings available to them. The good ones actually have gone beyond that and now have incorporated that into their core business really as a portion of it. And so I think sometimes it's important to kind of shut out the noise, which is often, you know, the mainstream media and all of those kind of things, which can be fairly depressing any day of the week.
and see the kind of general direction. And so, yes, I think the broad direction is that this is becoming more more popular. The process of it becoming more mainstream is a good thing, but it means that we need to kind of continue to think about how we do it better and more meaningfully, I think. know, was never, ever set up for us to be the only people doing this. The idea of Tribe was to bring everybody on a journey, and I think that has happened. I think...
Brandon Ashplant (32:55)
Hmm.
Cate Quentin (33:11)
Even we as a business are thinking about the what next? How do you push further again? And I, certainly from my discussions in the industry and advisors and everybody working in the wealth management space, I don't get the impression this is going away. I think it's had a bumpy couple of years, but I think it's going to continue and it's here to stay.
Brandon Ashplant (33:32)
Hmm. That's yeah, that's, that's interesting in the sense of the direction of travel is there. And then I suppose my, just to sort of focus in on that is that sort of, is that demand predominantly a generational thing or is it actually now widely being accepted across generations? Even if it is spearheaded by the younger sort of cohort, know, where does that sit in terms of the drivers and the pushers?
Cate Quentin (34:00)
think it comes from a real kind of mix, to be honest. We certainly see, from a kind of consumer-led push, I think we see a lot of drive from the younger generations. think we do. However, as I say, we have a lot of clients that are middle-aged or retired that are also kind of thinking about their own position in the world. know, what is it their legacy? What do they want to leave, really, from an investment perspective?
So I think we're seeing that drive from across the board, actually, certainly from an investment perspective, where I think things are a little less clear or have been a little less clear over the last kind of year or so is from a regulatory perspective. you know, if you've got your of, you know, your sort of bottom-up approach, that might be kind of your kind of
your retail investor, who your investors are, and then that needs to be supported from up above and the regulatory space. That has been a little bit slow, I think, in the last couple of years, but we're starting to see some real progress there, whether that's kind of SDR and processes around sustainability disclosures in the investment space, right through to kind of big, big kind of infrastructure acts like the Inflation Reduction Act in the US and things like that. So I think there is a
The regulatory regime is supportive and is driving it forward. I think clients across the board are interested in this space. There is no doubt that I think that if you are 25 and you're lucky enough to have some money today, your outlook is probably very different. We really don't know what the world is going to look like in 50 years time.
you know, inevitably that is going to change. That is going to be a kind of guiding principle for the younger generations.
Brandon Ashplant (35:58)
So, so, and finally, just to sort of, guess, bring it back to Guernsey, you know, we as an international finance center, see ourselves as very much at the forefront of this. talked that and talked.
Cate Quentin (35:59)
Thanks.
Brandon Ashplant (36:11)
or touched on, you say, on that point in the intro to the podcast today and sort of talked around, I guess those regular listeners will know that Guernsey sort of developed the world's first green fund regime in 2018 and sort of since then has gone on to develop a natural capital fund regime and kite market and so forth. And so Guernsey sees itself to some extent for a smaller jurisdiction, it sort of spearheads that territory in many respects. think it's fair to say. To what extent does
you, guess, personally, but also Tribe, see international finance centres like Guernsey in this space and how important are they sort of as players?
Cate Quentin (36:45)
I think it's incredibly important. I think touching on that intergenerational piece, the sort of international financial centres like Guernsey have a huge role to play as stewards of a lot of this money that's going to be moving down between generations particularly the kind of trustees on the island, the consultants, anyone who really advises on wealth has a big, big job in terms of helping
those different groups within families, they may be large, even larger kind of organizations to think about how they define what their values are, what impact needs to them, what they really want to achieve with this money. know, a lot of those conversations actually need to start at that kind of fiduciary stage, in my opinion. And so I think Guernsey, you know, is already doing a lot in this space and doing great work there. I think there's also something to think about kind of
the risk aspect of the conversation, which we haven't really touched on yet. mean, again, trustees will be more than aware of the kind of the risks that exist out there and those additional ones that kind of climate risk is bringing, for example, social unrest, all of these kind of issues that are being driven by sustainability. And I think that there's something that there's work that could be done to kind of...
really bring that conversation and bring these new kind of sustainability issues into that risk conversation if you like. And I know that's certainly happening with some of my contacts on the island. I think also, you know, at the end of the day, it's also about Guernsey is in this amazing position in that you are an island, have a position in the ocean. You are confronted with nature every day.
And I think so often, you know, it's very, very easy for anyone working in finance to sort of wake up in the morning, go to an office, shut the outside world off and just kind of get on with what's in front of them. But actually in Guernsey, I always think you're incredibly lucky in that you're confronted with the elements and, you know, and the world around you so closely.
And I think there's just something about bringing that kind of spirit, if you like, into the work that we're doing every day and our computers and how we're speaking to our clients and really going back to the idea of kind of what really matters at the end of the day. Because, you know, most people listening to this will know that actually people don't get that excited about kind of...
structuring or investments or risk and volatility and all of those kind of things. What really matters to them is the world around them. And bringing those two things together, I think, is something that Guernsey can really help to do. I'm really, really excited to kind of see that continue.
Brandon Ashplant (39:39)
that's a really lovely way of putting it. Well, thank you very much for your time and your insights today, Cate. It's been lovely chatting to you and a pleasure to have you on.
Cate Quentin (39:47)
Thank you, I've really, really enjoyed it. Thanks for having me.
Brandon Ashplant (39:50)
Thank you. And thanks also to you for listening. We have quite the of interviews and panel discussions on the Sustainable Finance Guernsey podcast channel. You can check them out by searching for Sustainable Finance Guernsey wherever you get your podcasts and whichever platform that may be. If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave a review or a comment. It's always great to get feedback from you.
And we'll be back soon with another episode of the Sustainable Finance Guernsey podcast. Until then, it's goodbye from Guernsey.