347. Sustainability is a journey, not a clear destination

Peter Michaelis, manager of the Liontrust Sustainable Future Managed fund, has over 20 years experience in sustainable responsible investment. He shares the evolution of sustainable investing, including challenges in recent years, and why the future remains bright. This fund has over 20 underlying themes, of which we cover a handful, including resource efficiency, circular economy, healthcare innovation and digital security, complete with valuable company examples throughout. We finish with a broader look at sustainability and the potential impact of politics and Trump 2.0.

What’s covered in this episode: 

• An introduction to the Liontrust Sustainable Future Managed fund
• Long term performance of the strategy
• Why the fund underperformed recently 
• How sustainable investing has evolved
• The three megatrends in the portfolio
• Better resource efficiency and circular use of materials
• Investing for greater resilience and safety
• Promoting a circular economy
• Two companies combating fast fashion 
• “We’re looking for the digital camera to Kodak”
• Two recent additions to the portfolio
• Opportunities in the mid-cap area of the market
• Why Trump isn’t all bad for sustainability

More about the fund: Liontrust Sustainable Future Managed aims to deliver capital growth over the long term through its own sustainable process and by investing in a combination of global equities, bonds and cash. The managers use a thematic approach to identify the key structural growth trends that will shape the global economy of the future, across a 40-60 stock portfolio.

Learn more on fundcalibre.com

Please remember, we’ve been discussing individual companies to bring investing to life for you. It’s not a recommendation to buy or sell. The fund may or may not still hold these companies at the time of listening. Elite Ratings are based on FundCalibre’s research methodology and are the opinion of FundCalibre’s research team only.