A majority of individual investors say they plan to increase their allocations to sustainable companies in the coming year, while more than 70% believe strong sustainability practices can lead to higher returns.
In fact, more than three quarters (77%) of individual investors around the world say they want to invest in companies or funds that aim to achieve market-rate financial returns while also considering positive social and/or environmental impact, according to a recent report from Morgan Stanley.
"Nearly 80% of individual investors believe that it is possible to balance market rate financial returns with a focus on sustainability," said Jessica Alsford, Morgan Stanley's chief sustainability officer and CEO of the Institute for Sustainable Investing. "These investors express a desire for their investments to advance positive environmental and social impact, creating opportunities for finance professionals to meet these needs."
But how can investors parse the complex world of sustainability assessments, ESG scores and emissions reporting? Investor's Business Daily is here to help, with its 2024 list of the Most Sustainable Companies. The 100 stocks on this list combine strong climate management scores from Morningstar Sustainalytics with superior IBD technical and fundamental stock ratings. They are well-positioned for investors concerned about the climate transition. Read all the stories in our full special report.
This list reveals which companies are leading the way to a lower-carbon future and are ready for the challenges of the energy transition in coming decades. The top ranks are filled with financial services, utility and consumer companies.
How IBD's Most Sustainable Companies List Was Created
To build IBD's 2024 list of the 100 Most Sustainable Companies, we started with Morningstar's U.S. and global Low Carbon Transition Leaders Indexes. These new indexes provide exposure to companies from each sector taking the most action toward transitioning to a low-carbon economy. The indexes target the best-scoring 50% of companies from each sector, by market capitalization. The indexes also seek to emphasize companies that report carbon emissions and are reducing their carbon intensity, as well as those whose business activities contribute positively to the environment.
Morningstar Sustainalytics provides an overall climate management score of 0 to 100. This indicates the strength of a company's systems for managing its exposure to the low-carbon transition, and factors in the issuer's investment alignment, metrics and targets, financial strength, and historical performance across the full business value chain. A score of 46 to 55 is average, 56 to 75 is strong, and 76 to 100 is very strong.
"When looking for companies that are well-prepared and positioned to survive and thrive in times of climate change, it is important for investors to look beyond companies' stated intentions to their actual strategies, actions and results," said Anya Solovieva, director, global commercial product strategy, climate solutions at Morningstar Sustainalytics. "Our Sustainalytics Low Carbon Transition Ratings tap into our global research, ratings and data to help investors tell the difference between climate intentions and climate actions."
We sorted the constituents of the Morningstar U.S. and global Low Carbon Transition Leaders Indexes using IBD technical and fundamental stock ratings. The result is a list of companies with a stock price of $10 or more and which have sufficient data to create an IBD Composite Rating. We further qualified the list by removing those companies that did not meet or beat the S&P 500's performance in the past five years and which had a Relative Strength Rating below 70.
We selected the companies with the highest IBD Composite Rating — all with scores of 80 or better, putting them in the top 20%. Finally, we ranked the companies by the climate management score, using the IBD Composite Rating to break any ties. To check current stock ratings and charts, visit the IBD Stock Checkup page.
Meet The Top 5 Among Sustainability Leaders
Topping the list this year is Moody's, demonstrating that a company that provides data on ESG factors can itself be a model of sustainability best practices. U.S. gas and electric utility Southern Co. is next on the list, and consumer giant Colgate-Palmolive is third.
Moody's also ranks No. 1 among financial services companies in our story on the best stocks in 11 industry sectors. Southern Co. topped the list among utilities, while Colgate led the consumer companies category.
Two more utility companies, Alliant Energy and NRG Energy, finished fourth and fifth, respectively, on this year's IBD 100 Most Sustainable Companies list.
Read More About The Top Winners On Our Most Sustainable Companies List: NRG Energy, Moody's, T-Mobile US
IBD's 100 Most Sustainable Companies
Here is IBD's 2024 list of the 100 most sustainable companies:
Note: At the bottom of the table, be sure to scroll to the right to see all the columns. Data is as of Sept. 5.
| Rank | Company | Symbol | Industry | Climate Management Score | Comp Rating | RS Rating | EPS Rating | SMR Rating | 3-Yr EPS growth rate | ROE | Last qtr sales % change | Last qtr EPS % change | Div yield |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Moody's | MCO | Financial Services | 70.8 | 95 | 90 | 86 | A | -6 | 62 | 22 | 43 | 0.70 |
| 2 | Southern Co. | SO | Utilities | 69.9 | 97 | 89 | 91 | C | 3 | 13 | 12 | 39 | 3.22 |
| 3 | Colgate-Palmolive | CL | Consumer | 69.7 | 91 | 91 | 88 | A | 2 | 531 | 5 | 18 | 1.84 |
| 4 | Alliant Energy | LNT | Utilities | 69.7 | 81 | 83 | 52 | C | 3 | 11 | -2 | -11 | 3.26 |
| 5 | NRG Energy | NRG | Utilities | 69.3 | 85 | 95 | 82 | D | n.a. | -6 | 5 | 170 | 2.08 |
| 6 | PPL | PPL | Utilities | 68.9 | 92 | 86 | 73 | C | 20 | 9 | 3 | 31 | 3.20 |
| 7 | T-Mobile US | TMUS | Communication Services | 68.0 | 94 | 88 | 93 | B | 29 | 14 | 3 | 23 | 1.32 |
| 8 | Brookfield | BN | Financial Services | 66.8 | 80 | 87 | 84 | C | -14 | 3 | -3 | 80 | 0.68 |
| 9 | Aflac | AFL | Financial Services | 66.3 | 94 | 93 | 87 | A | 4 | 18 | -1 | 16 | 1.82 |
| 10 | MSCI | MSCI | Financial Services | 65.8 | 85 | 73 | 92 | n.a. | 16 | 0 | 14 | 12 | 1.12 |
| 11 | Dominion Energy | D | Utilities | 65.3 | 85 | 83 | 71 | C | -3 | 11 | 10 | 86 | 4.66 |
| 12 | Healthpeak Properties | DOC | Real Estate | 64.2 | 87 | 82 | 59 | B | 3 | 5 | 28 | 0 | 5.43 |
| 13 | MetLife | MET | Financial Services | 64.2 | 85 | 80 | 88 | B | -8 | 19 | 7 | 18 | 2.85 |
| 14 | TJX | TJX | Consumer | 64.1 | 95 | 87 | 92 | A | 19 | 64 | 6 | 13 | 1.27 |
| 15 | IBM | IBM | Technology | 64.1 | 90 | 87 | 70 | A | 15 | 40 | 2 | 11 | 3.30 |
| 16 | Newmont | NEM | Basic Materials | 64.0 | 99 | 93 | 88 | B | -24 | 5 | 64 | 118 | 1.93 |
| 17 | AT&T | T | Communication Services | 63.4 | 81 | 87 | 38 | B | -6 | 18 | 0 | -10 | 5.38 |
| 18 | Campbell Soup | CPB | Consumer | 62.8 | 92 | 86 | 85 | A | 3 | 26 | 11 | 26 | 2.88 |
| 19 | AvalonBay Communities | AVB | Real Estate | 62.7 | 88 | 87 | 64 | B | 12 | 8 | 5 | 4 | 3.00 |
| 20 | Entergy | ETR | Utilities | 62.7 | 85 | 85 | 63 | C | 5 | 10 | 4 | 4 | 3.70 |
| 21 | Oracle | ORCL | Technology | 62.4 | 81 | 86 | 83 | A | 6 | 321 | 3 | -2 | 1.12 |
| 22 | S&P Global | SPGI | Financial Services | 62.0 | 96 | 88 | 91 | A | 7 | 11 | 14 | 29 | 0.70 |
| 23 | Autodesk | ADSK | Technology | 61.9 | 86 | 75 | 96 | A | 22 | 110 | 12 | 13 | n.a. |
| 24 | Canadian Imp Bank of Commerce | CM | Financial Services | 61.8 | 94 | 93 | 83 | A | -3 | 12 | 13 | 27 | 4.22 |
| 25 | Coca-Cola | KO | Consumer | 61.5 | 94 | 83 | 77 | A | 7 | 47 | 3 | 8 | 2.73 |
| 26 | American Electric Power | AEP | Utilities | 61.3 | 96 | 88 | 85 | B | 5 | 11 | 5 | 11 | 3.41 |
| 27 | Heico | HEIA | Industrials | 61.2 | 99 | 91 | 92 | A | 18 | 14 | 37 | 31 | 0.11 |
| 28 | Waste Connections | WCN | Industrials | 61.2 | 95 | 86 | 94 | A | 15 | 15 | 11 | 22 | 0.62 |
| 29 | XCEL Energy | XEL | Utilities | 61.0 | 87 | 81 | 82 | C | 6 | 11 | 0 | 4 | 3.45 |
| 30 | Republic Services | RSG | Industrials | 60.9 | 94 | 86 | 93 | A | 14 | 18 | 9 | 14 | 1.13 |
| 31 | Thomson Reuters | TRI | Commercial Services | 60.8 | 80 | 72 | 91 | A | 28 | 14 | 6 | -3 | 1.29 |
| 32 | Parker Hannifin | PH | Industrials | 60.7 | 84 | 87 | 91 | A | 18 | 30 | 2 | 11 | 1.13 |
| 33 | Ventas | VTR | Real Estate | 60.5 | 92 | 94 | 57 | C | 1 | 0 | 9 | 7 | 2.87 |
| 34 | Omnicom | OMC | Communication Services | 60.5 | 84 | 81 | 73 | A | 8 | 44 | 7 | 5 | 2.80 |
| 35 | BlackRock | BLK | Financial Services | 60.4 | 88 | 82 | 88 | A | -1 | 15 | 8 | 12 | 2.33 |
| 36 | WEC Energy | WEC | Utilities | 60.4 | 86 | 82 | 73 | C | 5 | 13 | -3 | -27 | 3.53 |
| 37 | AstraZeneca | AZN | Health Care | 60.1 | 93 | 83 | 79 | A | 18 | 29 | 13 | -8 | 1.75 |
| 38 | Nvidia | NVDA | Technology | 60.1 | 88 | 96 | 99 | A | 74 | 99 | 122 | 152 | 0.04 |
| 39 | Coca-Cola Europacific | CCEP | Consumer | 60.0 | 96 | 85 | 77 | A | 12 | 22 | 8 | 5 | 2.48 |
| 40 | Kimco Realty | KIM | Real Estate | 59.2 | 89 | 87 | 60 | B | 8 | 7 | 13 | 5 | 4.15 |
| 41 | Enbridge | ENB | Energy | 59.1 | 83 | 81 | 56 | C | 2 | 9 | 9 | -15 | 6.72 |
| 42 | Cigna | CI | Health Care | 58.6 | 91 | 82 | 90 | A | 11 | 27 | 25 | 10 | 1.58 |
| 43 | Duke Energy | DUK | Utilities | 58.5 | 92 | 87 | 88 | B | 0 | 9 | 9 | 25 | 3.58 |
| 44 | American Water Works | AWK | Utilities | 58.4 | 86 | 76 | 70 | A | 7 | 11 | 5 | -1 | 2.12 |
| 45 | Ecolab | ECL | Basic Materials | 58.4 | 83 | 82 | 89 | B | 8 | 20 | 3 | 35 | 0.92 |
| 46 | FB Financial | FBK | Financial Services | 58.3 | 87 | 94 | 69 | C | -10 | 10 | 2 | 9 | 1.46 |
| 47 | Iron Mountain | IRM | Commercial Services | 58.1 | 95 | 96 | 79 | A | 5 | 124 | 13 | 10 | 2.62 |
| 48 | Deckers Outdoor | DECK | Consumer | 58.1 | 90 | 75 | 99 | A | 29 | 39 | 22 | 88 | n.a. |
| 49 | Waste Management | WM | Industrials | 57.7 | 90 | 75 | 94 | A | 13 | 37 | 6 | 21 | 1.44 |
| 50 | Trane Technologies | TT | Industrials | 57.5 | 94 | 92 | 96 | A | 23 | 32 | 13 | 23 | 0.98 |
| 51 | eBay | EBAY | Consumer | 57.0 | 94 | 89 | 91 | A | 5 | 39 | 1 | 15 | 1.83 |
| 52 | UDR | UDR | Real Estate | 56.8 | 85 | 83 | 60 | B | 9 | 11 | 3 | 0 | 3.83 |
| 53 | Nasdaq | NDAQ | Financial Services | 56.5 | 97 | 92 | 70 | A | 6 | 17 | 25 | -3 | 1.31 |
| 54 | Williams | WMB | Energy | 56.3 | 81 | 87 | 84 | B | 19 | 20 | -6 | 2 | 4.24 |
| 55 | Sherwin-Williams | SHW | Basic Materials | 55.6 | 85 | 86 | 83 | A | 11 | 78 | 1 | 12 | 0.79 |
| 56 | Keurig Dr Pepper | KDP | Consumer | 55.4 | 94 | 80 | 85 | B | 7 | 10 | 4 | 7 | 2.33 |
| 57 | Gilead Sciences | GILD | Health Care | 55.4 | 84 | 78 | 54 | A | -16 | 38 | 5 | 50 | 3.91 |
| 58 | Equity Residential | EQR | Real Estate | 55.3 | 83 | 86 | 61 | B | 11 | 8 | 2 | 3 | 3.58 |
| 59 | ServiceNow | NOW | Technology | 55.1 | 95 | 88 | 99 | A | 35 | 35 | 22 | 32 | n.a. |
| 60 | Equifax | EFX | Commercial Services | 55.0 | 89 | 91 | 64 | A | -7 | 20 | 9 | 6 | 0.53 |
| 61 | TC Energy | TRP | Energy | 55.0 | 85 | 87 | 56 | A | 2 | 13 | 7 | -2 | 5.94 |
| 62 | Medtronic | MDT | Health Care | 54.9 | 83 | 70 | 52 | B | -1 | 14 | 3 | 3 | 3.13 |
| 63 | PNC Financial Services | PNC | Financial Services | 54.9 | 81 | 91 | 62 | B | 0 | 13 | 2 | -2 | 3.54 |
| 64 | UnitedHealth | UNH | Health Care | 54.7 | 91 | 85 | 88 | A | 17 | 28 | 6 | 11 | 1.41 |
| 65 | Essex Property Trust | ESS | Real Estate | 54.6 | 89 | 88 | 67 | B | 9 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 3.24 |
| 66 | Simon Property | SPG | Real Estate | 54.5 | 89 | 85 | 72 | A | 8 | 74 | 6 | 1 | 4.99 |
| 67 | Verisk Analytics | VRSK | Commercial Services | 54.4 | 87 | 73 | 89 | A | 12 | 82 | 6 | 15 | 0.57 |
| 68 | American Express | AXP | Financial Services | 54.2 | 88 | 91 | 93 | A | 10 | 32 | 10 | 21 | 1.11 |
| 69 | Howmet Aerospace | HWM | Industrials | 54.0 | 99 | 96 | 93 | A | 40 | 20 | 14 | 52 | 0.34 |
| 70 | Boston Scientific | BSX | Health Care | 53.5 | 97 | 90 | 90 | A | 16 | 16 | 14 | 17 | n.a. |
| 71 | Regeneron Pharmaceuticals | REGN | Health Care | 52.9 | 93 | 89 | 79 | A | -15 | 21 | 12 | 13 | n.a. |
| 72 | Agnico Eagle Mines | AEM | Basic Materials | 52.7 | 99 | 94 | 97 | B | -4 | 6 | 21 | 67 | 2.03 |
| 73 | Broadcom | AVGO | Technology | 52.7 | 93 | 93 | 87 | A | 22 | 78 | 43 | 7 | 1.37 |
| 74 | Booz Allen Hamilton | BAH | Commercial Services | 52.7 | 90 | 81 | 86 | A | 11 | 71 | 11 | -6 | 1.31 |
| 75 | United Rentals | URI | Industrials | 52.7 | 89 | 89 | 91 | A | 34 | 37 | 6 | 8 | 0.91 |
| 76 | McCormick | MKC | Consumer | 52.5 | 89 | 84 | 74 | B | -4 | 15 | -1 | 15 | 2.02 |
| 77 | Eli Lilly | LLY | Health Care | 52.3 | 97 | 92 | 93 | A | -1 | 53 | 36 | 86 | 0.57 |
| 78 | ADP | ADP | Commercial Services | 51.4 | 92 | 72 | 89 | A | 16 | 94 | 6 | 11 | 2.07 |
| 79 | Ross Stores | ROST | Consumer | 51.3 | 90 | 78 | 92 | A | 11 | 41 | 7 | 20 | 0.96 |
| 80 | Kinder Morgan | KMI | Energy | 51.1 | 81 | 84 | 71 | C | -5 | 7 | 2 | 4 | 5.35 |
| 81 | Chubb | CB | Financial Services | 50.8 | 97 | 87 | 92 | A | 28 | 17 | 17 | 9 | 1.27 |
| 82 | Arch Capital | ACGL | Financial Services | 50.7 | 98 | 91 | 98 | A | 57 | 21 | 34 | 34 | n.a. |
| 83 | Extra Space Storage | EXR | Real Estate | 50.5 | 95 | 89 | 73 | A | 9 | 9 | 59 | 0 | 3.73 |
| 84 | JPMorgan Chase | JPM | Financial Services | 50.3 | 94 | 90 | 84 | A | 15 | 17 | 22 | 3 | 2.11 |
| 85 | Marsh & McLennan | MMC | Financial Services | 50.1 | 92 | 78 | 90 | A | 14 | 35 | 6 | 10 | 1.43 |
| 86 | Public Storage | PSA | Real Estate | 50.0 | 93 | 89 | 72 | A | 14 | 21 | 5 | -1 | 3.52 |
| 87 | Pentair | PNR | Industrials | 49.4 | 82 | 81 | 89 | B | 7 | 21 | 2 | 18 | 1.08 |
| 88 | TransUnion | TRU | Commercial Services | 49.0 | 96 | 92 | 88 | A | 2 | 16 | 8 | 15 | 0.44 |
| 89 | Burlington Stores | BURL | Consumer | 48.9 | 96 | 94 | 86 | A | -6 | 44 | 13 | 100 | n.a. |
| 90 | Oneok | OKE | Energy | 48.8 | 98 | 90 | 81 | A | 21 | 23 | 31 | 28 | 4.31 |
| 91 | Travelers | TRV | Financial Services | 48.7 | 90 | 86 | 92 | B | -4 | 13 | 12 | 4083 | 1.81 |
| 92 | Wheaton Precious Metals | WPM | Basic Materials | 48.2 | 98 | 89 | 88 | A | -6 | 8 | 13 | 6 | 1.02 |
| 93 | Allegion | ALLE | Industrials | 48.2 | 89 | 85 | 78 | A | 12 | 54 | 6 | 11 | 1.41 |
| 94 | TransDigm | TDG | Industrials | 47.9 | 91 | 86 | 92 | n.a. | 45 | 0 | 17 | 24 | n.a. |
| 95 | Goldman Sachs | GS | Financial Services | 47.8 | 90 | 91 | 88 | B | -29 | 7 | 19 | 180 | 2.46 |
| 96 | Morgan Stanley | MS | Financial Services | 47.5 | 89 | 78 | 88 | B | -14 | 9 | 18 | 47 | 3.72 |
| 97 | Cintas | CTAS | Industrials | 47.3 | 94 | 93 | 96 | A | 15 | 38 | 8 | 20 | 0.78 |
| 98 | Ameriprise Financial | AMP | Financial Services | 45.9 | 97 | 80 | 93 | A | 18 | 73 | 9 | 17 | 1.35 |
| 99 | Brookfield | BN | Financial Services | 45.6 | 80 | 87 | 84 | C | -14 | 3 | -3 | 80 | 0.68 |
| 100 | Texas Pacific Land | TPL | Energy | 45.5 | 98 | 95 | 91 | A | 26 | 640 | 7 | 14 | 0.59 |
Sources: IBD, Morningstar. This list includes only U.S-traded stocks priced at 10-plus, with an IBD Composite Rating of 80 or better, RS Rating of 70 or better, and among the constituents of the Morningstar Low Carbon Transition Leaders Indexes. Data is as of 9/5/24. The 100 companies on this list are ranked by climate management score. Ties are broken by the highest Composite Rating, and then by RS Rating and EPS Rating. All stocks on the list met or beat the S&P 500's performance over the past five years.
The Most Sustainable Companies logos and accolades are available for licensing through Investor's Business Daily's partner, The YGS Group, by email at IBDlicensing@theygsgroup.com or at 800-290-5460.
