The Impact Score and impact analytics you see in Ziggma are designed to reflect real-world impact, real outcomes, and real alignment with your values. Impact investing is fundamentally different from ESG investing, which focuses on the environmental, social, and governance risks that may affect a company’s financial performance. Impact investing instead measures how a company affects the world around it.
To evaluate impact credibly and transparently, Ziggma works with ACA Ethos, one of the most rigorous and respected impact data engines globally. Below is a clear explanation of how Ethos gathers, validates, and transforms data into meaningful insights, and transforms these into an Impact Score and variety of sub-scores.
TDLR – How the Impact Score Is Calculated
➡️ Ethos captures ~600 raw metrics (emissions, labor, controversies, resource use, diversity…).
➡️ These metrics build into 80 topic-level sub-scores such as Climate Action, Fair Labor, Gender Equality, or Sustainable Resource Use.
The Portfolio and Security Impact Score shows how well a portfolio, company or fund contributes to positive real-world impact, using ACA Ethos’ industry-leading 600-metric dataset. Sub-scores reflect the four impact topics most relevant to private investors.
➡️ Each topic aggregates 30–60 weighted metrics.
➡️ Ethos then normalizes the results across peer groups and the global universe.
➡️ Ziggma displays a 0–100 Impact Score representing a company’s or fund’s overall positive impact. The higher the score, the greater the positive impact a portfolio, company or fund has on the planet and society.
1. What ACA Ethos Does — and Why It Matters for Real Impact
Ethos aggregates and analyzes roughly 600 environmental and social metrics. This allows Ziggma to understand:
✔️ how companies affect people and the planet,
✔️ how portfolios align with positive outcomes,
✔️ how emissions, controversies, fines, and social practices translate into measurable impact, and
✔️ where genuine progress is occurring—and where it is not.
The data engine incorporates raw indicators such as emissions, workforce diversity, human rights controversies, patents, and labor conditions. These feed into approximately 80 topic-level ratings that cover both impact themes and ESG-risk topics. While ESG risk topics follow materiality frameworks, Ziggma’s Impact Score draws directly on impact-oriented metrics that reflect positive outcomes, not risk management.
2. How Ethos Collects Data: Deep, Multi-Source, and Continuously Updated
Ethos sources impact data from a wide range of reputable channels, including:
✔️ corporate disclosures and sustainability reports,
✔️government databases and regulatory agencies,
✔️ NGOs and academic bodies,
✔️licensed third-party providers, and
✔️ automated media scraping complemented by manual analyst verification.
This diverse dataset flows into Ethos’ secure cloud platform, where it undergoes a multi-layer validation process before being integrated into Ziggma’s production systems.
Monthly Updates
Most metrics are refreshed monthly. Ethos performs:
✔️ multi-layer quality control checks,
✔️ validation within a staging environment, and
✔️ randomized datapoint audits that must achieve 100% accuracy.
Only after passing each step is the data released into the live environment.
Peer-Modeled Data (Transparent & Optional)
Where companies fail to disclose certain information, Ethos models values using peer-group averages adjusted for revenue or workforce size. All modeled datapoints are clearly flagged, and Ziggma users can choose to exclude them from their ratings.
3. Daily Controversy Monitoring — A Key Component of Trust
Impact is not only about measuring positive contributions; it also requires detecting harmful behavior. Ethos operates a robust controversy monitoring system that scans global media multiple times per day across regions such as:
✔️ the U.S. and Canada,
✔️ the UK and Europe,
✔️Japan,
✔️ India,
✔️Australia,
✔️ Brazil, and additional significant markets.
How Each Controversy Is Evaluated
Every controversy is reviewed and categorized using a consistent framework. Analysts assign:
A severity score ranging from 1 (most severe) to 10 (least severe), evaluating factors such as human harm, environmental damage, scale of impact, and company involvement.
One or more of 25 category tags, including human rights violations, environmental issues, data security breaches, accounting misconduct, labor practices, or product safety failures.
A validated record, complete with summary, severity score, category tags, and source references.
This ensures Ziggma users have timely, unbiased visibility into negative events that affect a company’s real-world impact.
4. Turning Data Into Impact Ratings That Actually Mean Something
Ethos groups its ~600 metrics into roughly 80 topics that span both ESG risk and real-world impact. Impact topics include:
Climate Action
Gender Equality
Quality Education
Affordable Healthcare
Healthy Oceans
Fair Labor
Innovation
Sustainable Resource Use
Biodiversity
Access to Housing, Water & Sanitation
Each topic incorporates 30–60 weighted metrics, selected for their relevance to the outcome being measured, the credibility of the underlying data, and the reliability of reporting.
Rating Process (0–100)
Ethos uses a structured methodology to produce meaningful ratings:
✔️ raw metric data is normalized,
✔️ metrics are weighted based on relevance and credibility,
✔️ topic-level scores are calculated,
✔️ results are normalized again relative to peer groups and the global universe, and
✔️ final ratings are aggregated at the company or fund level.
Ethos uses these topic ratings to build Impact Scores that reflect true positive contributions, rather than ESG risk metrics repackaged as impact.
5. Impact-Focused Analyses You See Inside Ziggma
Ethos powers a set of advanced analyses that help investors understand both performance and real-world outcomes. These include:
Controversy Exposure
A weighted assessment of controversy severity across 25 categories, providing insight into the negative events associated with portfolio holdings.
Global Warming Alignment (°C)
A weighted assessment of controversy severity across 25 categories, providing insight into the negative events associated with portfolio holdings.
Carbon Footprint (PCAF-aligned)
An estimate of how many metric tons of CO₂ emissions a portfolio finances, calculated according to recognized industry standards.
Carbon Comparison Metrics
Comparisons across Scope 1–3 emissions, emissions intensity, emission reductions over time, and exposure to climate solutions.
85+ Impact & Ethical Screens
Options such as fossil-free strategies, fair labor filters, deforestation-free criteria, and transparency & accountability screens.
Ziggma integrates all of this into a clean, intuitive interface that helps investors understand both performance and real-world impact at a glance.
Why This Matters for You — and Why It’s Different From ESG
Impact investing is about shaping real-world outcomes, not merely avoiding ESG risks. Ziggma helps you see how companies contribute to a more sustainable future, how your portfolio aligns with climate goals, where positive impact is strong, and where controversies undermine progress.
Ethos provides the granular, independently validated, and continuously updated data that makes this possible. Together, Ziggma and Ethos deliver a new level of transparency and credibility—ensuring the impact insights you rely on are genuine, rigorous, and aligned with what true impact investing represents.