As an overarching strategy, we adopt a screening approach for companies involved in the production or distribution of cluster bombs, landmines, anti-personnel mines, depleted uranium, biological and chemical weapons, nuclear weapons, cluster munitions, blinding lasers,white phosphorus, non-detectable fragments, incendiary weapons, convinced that they undermine the fundamental human rights.
This exclusion is applied to all our active funds, while for funds with a benchmark, the fund managers cannot invest exceeding the percentage of the benchmark itself.
We believe that ESG issues are often materially reflected in the stock price and the sustainability of the business of our invested companies. Therefore, we took an approach of integrating environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues into investment analysis and decision-making across the full range of assets.
ESG principles are applied to all active management funds, both benchmark-based and flexible. These include specialised ESG products, which consider specific factors and use an appropriate internal ESG rating system, and ethical products with dedicated benchmarks that are managed in respect of strict criteria in selecting positive and negative issuers. ESG criteria are not applied to passive/index-linked products, and to so-called "wrapper" products (such as, for instance, funds of funds, retail and unit-linked portfolios). Every three months, the SRI Committee (chaired by the CEO) discussed about the lowest rated issuers in our portfolios, deciding about the escalation process to apply. Issuers are then subject to an 18 months engagement timeframe and a potential voting at the AGM. Subsequently, without evidence of the issuer's improving ESG profile, they are divested from all products.
Previously, in 2018 Eurizon launched a Green Bond Fund, characterized by a thematic approach. In total, we have launched 34 ESG prodcuts (12 in 2019).