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Credit Suisse’s Environmental Impact Fund caters to the demand of Asia-based private wealth clients who seek effective investments that could benefit from the transformation of global consumer preferences driving innovation and the demand for eco-friendly products, materials and solutions.

The Environmental Impact Fund is dedicated to investing in companies that design and develop environmental technologies specifically related to four sub-themes under the UN Sustainable Development Goals: sustainable infrastructure, resources, waste mitigation and carbon reduction technologies. In order to invest in companies that can deliver the best return to investors, the fund took a benchmark-agnostic approach and delivers a clear bias toward smaller companies, providing investment access to lesser-known innovators and entrepreneurs by conducting comprehensive research worldwide.

The fund portfolio consists of 40-60 companies that aren’t widely known international conglomerates, but industry leaders that offer specific environmental protection solutions, with a typical weighting of 1.0% to 4.0% per holding. By defining its investment universe to concentrate on ‘pure-play’ companies which generate 50% or more of its revenues from the theme, the fund is picking its constituents from an investment universe of around 250 listed stocks in multiple exchanges internationally, with a natural tilt towards the US and Scandinavian countries.

The fund outperformed MSCI World ESG leaders by 5 pps in the first month of its launch and delivers a 39% return on a one-year basis through the end of August 2021, compared to a 31% return achieved by the benchmark in the same period. This demonstrates to Asian private clients that active investing with an eye on ESG, sustainability and the environment can be rewarding both personally and financially.

Since the soft launch of the fund in June 2020, it has gained significant traction: its AUM grew five-fold since its initial launch in 14 months from private banking investors alone, with around 20% of the total AUM contributed by Asian private clients.

Credit Suisse Asset Management is Asian Private Banker’s winner of Best New Fund for 2022.