What are people interested in sustainable investing searching for when they research where to put their money?
Julia Dreblow, founder of Fund EcoMarket, a brilliant resource for anyone who wants to narrow down their fund choices according to their principles, has some insights, based upon what people search for on the site…
For those of us who love a good list – here are the top 100 searched carried out on Fund EcoMarket from 1 January to 1 September 2019 … once again highlighting the need for a combination of ‘conventional financial’ and ESG / SRI policy and strategy information.
These resulted from a total of 21,219 ‘clicks’ (events) – according to Google Analytics.
What values-based investors are searching for:
| 1. OEIC/Unit Trust |
| 2. Sustainability Themed |
| 3. Equity |
| 4. Ethically Balanced |
| 5. Global |
| 6. Environmentally Themed |
| 7. Mixed Asset |
| 8. UK |
| 9. Negative Ethical |
| 10. Equity Income |
| 11. Environmental policy |
| 12. Investment Trust |
| 13. Passive Equity |
| 14. Fixed Interest |
| 15. Coal, oil &/or gas majors excluded |
| 16. Unclassified |
| 17. Armaments manufacturers avoided |
| 18. Europe |
| 19. Invests in clean energy/renewables |
| 20. Climate change / GHG policy |
| 21. Property |
| 22. Animal testing exclusion policy |
| 23. Emerging Markets |
| 24. Tobacco production avoided |
| 25. Animal welfare policy |
| 26. USA |
| 27. Asia Pacific |
| 28. ESG Plus |
| 29. Fracking and tar sands excluded |
| 30. Pension |
| 31. Infrastructure |
| 32. Social Themed |
| 33. Not Set |
| 34. Europe Ex-UK |
| 35. Sustainability policy |
| 36. Clean energy themed |
| 37. Deforestation / palm oil policy |
| 38. Ethical policies |
| 39. Pornography avoidance policy |
| 40. Sustainability themed |
| 41. Human rights |
| 42. SICAV/Offshore* |
| 43. Gambling avoidance policy |
| 44. Limits exposure to carbon intensive industries |
| 45. Aims to generate positive impacts |
| 46. Child labour exclusion |
| 47. DFM/Portfolio Planner* |
| 48. Nuclear exclusion policy |
| 49. Plastics policy / reviewing plastics |
| 50. Europe >50% UK |
| 51. Available via an ISA |
| 52. Positive environmental impact theme |
| 53. Social policy |
| 54. Not set |
| 55. Responsible Ownership (FM company) |
| 56. Alcohol production excluded |
| 57. Positive selection bias |
| 58. Sustainable transport policy or theme |
| 59. Negative selection bias |
| 60. Strictly screened ethical fund |
| 61. Water / sanitation policy |
| 62. Faith Based |
| 63. Health & wellbeing policies |
| 64. Governance policy |
| 65. Environmental damage and pollution policy |
| 66. ESG/SRI engagement |
| 67. Balances company ‘pros and cons’/best in sector |
| 68. FP WHEB Sustainability – C Share Acc |
| 69. Positive social impact theme |
| 70. Favours cleaner, greener companies |
| 71. Janus Henderson Global Sustainable Equity |
| 72. Hedge |
| 73. Avoids companies with poor governance (new) |
| 74. Measures positive impacts |
| 75. Anti-bribery and corruption policy (new) |
| 76. Responsible supply chain policy or theme |
| 77. Other |
| 78. Resource efficiency policy or theme |
| 79. Rathbone Ethical Bond Inc |
| 80. FP Foresight Infrastructure Income Fund |
| 81. Oppressive regimes exclusion policy |
| 82. Janus Henderson Institutional Global Responsible Managed |
| 83. In house responsible ownership/voting expertise |
| 84. ESG integration strategy |
| 85. Invests in environmental solutions companies (new) |
| 86. Tobacco avoidance policy (FM company) |
| 87. M&G Positive Impact Fund |
| 88. Fossil fuel exclusion policy (FM company) |
| 89. Responsible Ownership (under review) |
| 90. Kames Global Sustainable Equity Fund |
| 91. Liontrust Sustainable Future UK Growth 1 |
| 92. Employ specialist ESG/SRI/sustainability researchers |
| 93. Liontrust Sustainable Future Global Growth 1 |
| 94. Kames Ethical Equity A |
| 95. Liontrust Sustainable Future Defensive Managed |
| 96. Invests in sustainability/ESG disruptors (new) |
| 97. Janus Henderson UK Responsible Income |
| 98. Life |
| 99. RSMR Rated |
| 100. Kames Ethical Cautious Managed |
This list shows a number of things. For one, it shows that these are real investments, people need to have the right core conventional product features in order to consider investing in them. That message is crucially important to the success of this area in my view – amidst all the excitement we must first and foremost remember these are real investments.
The high rating of our SRI Styles, specifically Sustainable Themed, Environmental Themed and Ethical (Balanced and Negative) hint at both the most important issues to clients and also the usefulness of categorising funds. This is most probably in part because people find our online SRI Stylefinder fact find questionnaire useful – and also because there are now so many funds in this area that this helps make the fund selection process easier.
With regard to individual issues – unsurprisingly perhaps ‘Avoids coal, oil and gas majors’ ranking highest in that area should be no surprise to anyone who is concerned about climate change – alongside other related areas such as ‘Environment Policy’ and ‘Fracking and Tar sands excluded’. The high ranking of more traditional areas may however surprise some. The high ranking of opposition to investment in armaments companies, companies that test on animals and tobacco companies were not far behind environmental concerns – showing that the concerns of the earliest ethical investors remain alive and well in the UK today.
