Citywire: The Ratings Radar Show

Should funds banking on clean energy be whiter than white? Or do they need to spread their net wider? The question of how Europe transitions to clean energy sources has never been more pressing.  The Russian invasion of Ukraine has shone the spotlight on how and where we source the gas and oil to keep wheels turning and houses warm – not to mention reducing our dependency on the stuff over the longer term to keep the planet from overheating.  Which is why Frank Talbot looks this week at fund manager Suzanne Senellart who runs the huge Europe Environmental Equity fund for Mirova, a boutique dedicated to ESG funds.  Along with Nisha Long and Angus Foote, we take a deep dive into what should and shouldn’t go into such funds (Tech companies? Mining giants that extract the materials we’ll need to build the green infrastructure?). Piotr Kuszneruk produces the show. And with that, it’s goodbye from us at the Citywire Ratings Radar Show. After two years and 42 editions, we’re calling it a wrap.  Thank you so much for listening – we hope you enjoyed it all as much as we did.    

Tech stock prices have collapsed in both public and private markets. What happens next? This latest edition of the Citywire Ratings Radar show has a different flavour. We’ve taken a break from the usual format of four talking heads around a virtual table. Instead, I sat down in the Citywire Studio to talk with Katelyn Donnelly, managing partner at New York VC firm Avalanche on everything from tech stock prices to private market funding and DAOs.

There are so many good female fund managers that finding one to focus on for International Women’s Day wasn’t a problem. Amid all the turmoil in Ukraine, It was also International Women’s Day last week when we all sat down for the latest edition of the Citywire Ratings Radar Show.    So it was only natural that Nisha Long – one of the industry’s biggest champions of female fund managers - should pick China specialist Rebecca Jiang of JP Morgan to focus on.  And her track record is amazing – AAA rated by Citywire ever since she became eligible in 2020 – all with six funds encompassing billions of dollars.  Lots to talk about with Frank Talbot, Angus Foote and Richard Lander asking the questions and Alan Walsh looking after the production. 

Infrastructure is a good asset class to be in right now. It’s defensive and a decent hedge against inflation. And let’s face it, we’re going to need a lot more of it soon to replace our crumbling bridges, power plants and roads. Noel O’Halloran of KBI has a twist on infrastructure investment. As the name implies,  the KBI Global Sustainable Infrastructure Fund directs its money in line with the quest for net zero carbon emissions. So he’s more likely to invest in water and green energy companies than oil pipelines.  As Frank Talbot tells us, O’Halloran is really good at his job, having held a Citywire AAA fund manager rating for the past 15 months.  Nisha Long,  Angus Foote and Richard Lander listen in and Alan Walsh produces it all. 

The Royal London Asset Management has been walking the walk in ESG for longer than most others – and providing investors with great returns along the way  Mike Fox’s credentials as an ESG manager are pretty compelling.   Mike has been building ESG into his investment process long before most in the investment industry knew what the initials stood for.  ‘Does this company have a benefit to society?’ is the key question he wants answered before he invests.   And his Citywire Fund Manager Rating record is stupendous.   The Royal London Asset Management manager first got a AAA rating in 2006 and holds one today. Apart from one month, he’s been rated ever since February 2013. And that’s for mandates covering mixed assets and both UK and global equities.   Nisha Long runs the rule over what makes him so special. Frank Talbot,  Angus Foote, and Richard Lander ask the questions and Alan Walsh produces the show. 

Martin Lau of FSSA Investment Managers  is a remarkable fund manager with consistently high risk-related returns in several sectors It’s hard to pick holes in Martin Lau’s track record as a fund manager. Holding a Citywire Fund Manager Rating almost without a break for the last 15 years is one thing; to do so across 16 funds in several sectors such as China, Japan and Asia is extraordinary.  Which is why Frank Talbot wanted to highlight him in this latest edition of the Citywire Ratings Radar Show, focusing particularly on his stewardship of the FSSA China Growth fund.

Yes, 2021 was the year that had the lot. Reddit, meme stocks, crypto, and electric car companies with multi-billion dollar valuations and no revenue.  So welcome to the final 2021 episode of the Citywire Ratings Radar show.  Nisha Long shakes her head a d takes us through what happened while Angus Foote looks forward to 2022 and believes fundamentals will reassert themselves, as they always do.  Frank Talbot thinks not much has changed with worries about inflation, China and Covid variants still top of mind. His other suggestion is to listen to the latest episode of the Citywire Mistakes were Made podcast with legendary investor Jeremy Grantham Richard Lander asks the questions, and producer Alan Walsh makes it all hang together. From all of us, to all of you, have a great break. 

China has done its best to put off investors this year while India has continued to open up rapidly.  It sounds like an easy choice but – spoiler alert – it isn’t.   In this week’s Citywire Ratings Radar show, Frank Talbot takes a close look at where the money is going. Surprisingly, flows into China continue to be strong with investors cannily buying the dips.  The Indian market has had an amazingly strong year, so the question there is whether it will rise further or if it’s time to take some profits.  On top of that, India’s economic reforms aren’t going down all that well at home and the pandemic showed the huge fragility of the country’s infrastructure.  Richard Lander,  Nisha Long and Angus Foote join in the discussion with producer Alan Walsh provides overseeing it all. Now take a listen!

You might get the impression that every fund selector now chooses all their investments on an ESG basis. You might have to think again. Citywire’s flagship Berlin event returned in real life and how good was it to be back? It was a great opportunity to hear directly from Europe’s fund selectors for the first time in two years. One surprising aspect was that for all the growing hype about ESG – and the strong fund flows for such vehicles - it doesn’t seem to be the primary tool for fund selection just yet. Just 35% of the selectors we polled said they had more than 50% of their investments allocated  using an ESG approach  In this week’s Citywire Ratings Radar show, Berlin attendees Richard Lander and Angus Foote run through this and other take-aways from the event with Frank Talbot and Nisha Long. Producer Alan Walsh provides the audio polish.

It's not all about FAANGs. It's time to give small and mid-cap companies the respect they deserve. Nothing in asset management is easy, but running a global mandate for small and medium companies is tougher than most. You have a lot of companies to deal with across many jurisdictions and many have little or no analyst coverage. But it’s a sector of the market that has been pretty strong over the past year. In this week’s Citywire Ratings Radar show, Frank Talbot runs the rule over some of the best fund managers in the area while Nisha Long, looking head to COP-26, looks at the huge amounts of cash going into equity funds that hold the EU sustainable seal of approval.    Richard Lander and Angus Foote host while producer Lucía Garré makes it all worth listening to.