Ep 33 ft. Matt Wirz

Green Bonds for Everyone! Matt Wirz (Wall Street Journal) helped uncover the Hunger Bond scandal in the Venezuelan debt. Conversations with Matt about why investors are willing to buy debt issued by odious regimes led to conversations about ESG, green bonds, sin stocks, and the new popularity of "green" sovereign debt. Recent sovereign debt related proposals include conducting debt for climate swaps to help countries deal with their gargantuan Covid debts. We talk with Matt about the so-called "greenium" (do investors really pay for green bonds?) and about whether all this ESG talk should be taken seriously. Call us skeptical. That said, there is a lot of talk. And where there is talk . . . Producer: Leanna Doty