New realm for ESG investing

Investors are demanding ethically responsible investment options and fund managers are being forced to respond, according to boutique administration platform, The Emerald Wrap.

The socially responsible investment platform's director, Matthew Dent, said fund managers now had to structure their portfolios while keeping environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues at the top of their minds.

Meanwhile, Instreet Investment managing director, George Lucas, said fund managers had responded accordingly and there had never been such an abundance of products in the marketplace that aligned to investors' needs.

"We look at all the upcoming sectors, clean technology, renewables, 4D printing, water, health, divestment and equality, to name a few, where investors can dovetail their risk/rewards goals while meeting their ESG concerns," Lucas said.

The days of one generic fund were over, as new platforms and technologies allowed customers to increasingly tailor-make their own solutions, he said.

Dent said the day where ESG issues only received lip service are gone, as now both institutional and retail investors demanded their investments be socially and environmental sound.

Two dimensional approaches to risk and reward were over and were replaced by four-dimensional frameworks that allowed investors to add ‘impact' and ‘alignment' to their portfolios, he said.