In the media

Podcast on investment mandates

PRI Podcast on setting ESG and real world outcomes in investment mandates

A 25 minutes PRI podcast with Toby Belsom (PRI) and Daniel Ingram (Wilshire) about integrating ESG issues and real world outcomes into investment mandates. PRI: "A key piece of the jigsaw for asset owners who have signed up to climate commitments such as net zero. It follows on from PRI's overview of current market practice".

Report: ESG in investment mandates

PRI report on setting ESG and real world outcomes in investment mandates

Investment mandates are a valuable and often underutilised tool for asset owners to signal ESG and real world outcomes requirements to asset managers. Once they have completed the policy setting process, asset owners can communicate their expectations for ESG integration and real world outcomes across a portfolio through the investment mandate. Proceeding to manager selection, appointment and monitoring without addressing ESG factors in mandates is a common – but easily remedied – oversight. Informed by interviews with asset owners and investment consultants, and data on industry practice, this report outlines common approaches and challenges to incorporating ESG considerations and sustainability outcomes in new or existing investment mandates.

SPIL paper (Dutch) "Investing for a better world"

SPIL paper over de ambitie en verantwoordelijkheid van pensioenfondsen om de negatieve uitkomsten en de positieve uitkomsten van de beleggingen op duurzaamheid respectievelijk te minimaliseren en te maximaliseren.

Blog - Investing with SDG outcomes

Beyond ESG incorporation: how the SDGs can help investors shape outcomes in the world

PRI Blog, June 15th 2020, with Shelagh Whitley

Long-term investing, IPE May 2020

What can boards and trustees do to accelerate long term investing when economies rebound? The IPE article identifies he best practices to make long term investing a success. The good news: successful long-term investing strategies are within reach for all funds. They can be implemented within the regular investment cycle of pension funds, and boards can make this a success by just making minor adjustments to their process. Simple (governance) steps instead of grand visions do the trick.

A look at designing and implementing long-term pension investment mandates

With any pension investment, plan sponsors must follow the same steps: set a policy, select asset managers and ensure strong governance, monitoring and evaluation. Pension funds can take additional steps to better embed long-term principles throughout the entire investment cycle, according to a working paper by Alfred Slager, a professor of pension fund management at the TIAS School for Business and Society in the Netherlands and a trustee at the country’s Pension Fund for General Practitioners, and Marcel Jeucken, a director at independent advisory firm SustFin.

Article in Canadian Investment Review, January 10th, 2020

Long-Term Investing by Pension Funds - How to Effectively Design and Implement Mandates: a Dutch Case Study

Pension funds are increasingly trying to embed long-term investing choices within their portfolios. Many publications focus on the rationale for long term investing; however, it remains unclear what long term investing actually is, what sets it apart from the current way of investing, and how it should add value. The purpose of this paper is to provide a practical framework for pension fund trustees aiming to bolster and implement long term investing. In doing so, the paper’s contribution is that we choose the trustee’s perspective, build on different existing election and monitoring frameworks, and argue that pension boards have more instruments at hand to implement long-term investing.

Toepassing langetermijnbeleggen: eenvoudiger dan het lijkt?

Nederlandse pensioenfondsen zijn bij uitstek langetermijnbeleggers met verplichtingen die reiken tot aan soms wel het eind van deze eeuw. Veel fondsen geloven ook dat hun lange adem hen in staat stelt hogere rendementen te behalen dan beleggers met een kortere horizon en dat, zeker op de langere termijn, sociale, milieu- en governanceprestaties (ESG) zich ook financieel uitbetalen. Maar wat voor pensioenfondsen natuurlijk lijkt, is dat niet voor de financiële markten waar zij zich op begeven en de vermogensbeheerders die het pensioengeld beheren.

Pension capital should lead

Major investors must also look at the impact of their own actions on the stability of the financial markets and on the real economy. Pension capital should not follow, but lead, says Marcel Jeucken, PGGM's managing director for responsible investment, in an interview with Financial Investigator.

Launch US Stewardship Principles

Een goede stap naar betere governance cultuur in VS. ​Grote Amerikaanse beleggers scharen zich achter een aantal principes die zullen bijdragen aan een gezondere cultuur van corporate governance in de VS. De publicatie, op 31 januari 2017, van US Stewardship and Corporate Governance Principles is een memorabele stap in de Amerikaanse corporate governance-geschiedenis. Het is voor het eerst dat in de VS een groep institutionele beleggers zelf principes voor goed aandeelhouderschap en goed ondernemingsbestuur opstelt.

Impact investing measurement

SDG-gerelateerde beleggingen door ‘finance first’ beleggers staat nog in de kinderschoenen. Er zijn allerlei uitdagingen, zoals dat SDG-beleggingen kunnen ontaarden in ‘greenwashing’. Zulke bedenkingen kunnen worden weggenomen door tastbare en vergelijkbare uitkomsten te meten en te communiceren. Met het oog daarop hebben Nederlandse financiële instellingen en bedrijven een beperkt aantal kernindicatoren geselecteerd voor elk van de belegbare SDG’s, met geloofwaardigheid en werkbaarheid als uitgangspunt. De focus ligt op indicatoren die de absolute, positieve impact ‘vastleggen’, voortkomend uit het gebruik van bepaalde producten en diensten (niet zozeer via het productieproces).

Low carbon index

PGGM, the €186bn asset manager for the Dutch healthcare pension fund PFZW, has a low carbon index designed around reweighing and active engagement with the 250 constituent companies. The fund is gradually shifting its passive equity allocation - accounting for 90 per cent of its total equity portfolio - to the index, says Marcel Jeucken, PGGM’s Managing Director of Responsible Investment.

Steering power of pension capital

Voor mijn nieuwe boek, 'Geld stuurt de wereld', sprak ik met verschillende financiële experts. In dit interview: Marcel Jeucken, managing director Responsible Investment bij PGGM, een van de meest verantwoorde pensioenbeleggers ter wereld. Maar Marcel Jeucken is nog lang niet tevreden. ‘We kunnen nog zoveel méér doen.’

Long-term investing

Customised benchmarks, absolute return strategies and long-term mandates are all being considered by the PGGM executive team as it implements the new PFZW investment framework. Amanda White spoke to Ruulke Bagijn chief investment officer of private markets and Marcel Jeucken, managing director responsible investment at PGGM about what it really means to be a long-term investor.

Video on responsible investment

This video interview was recorded in New York City on 13 December 2011 during the ESG USA 2011 Conference “Investing for a Sustainable Economy,” organized by Responsible Investor in association with Bloomberg.

Original title and source: “Next up in SRI: proving the societal value of investments”, Marcel Jeucken, www.tias.edu, February 3, 2012.

ESG index

In passive equities, where 90 per cent of the equities investments reside, about $44 billion in market-cap and smart beta strategies, the dual goals of it’s risk/return profile and responsible investment have been more challenging. But now PGGM has developed an index in house, which measures the 2800 companies in the FTSE All World Index for their environmental and social policy and good governance. The index re-ranks the companies based on these criteria, which also include a minimum threshold. 

Culture crucial to integration

Some of responsible investing’s most sophisticated adherents have moved from token aspirations to attempting to imbed environmental, social, governance integration into all their investment decisions. Top1000funds.com talked to Dutch asset manager PGGM and Danish fund ATP, which are both widely regarded as ESG leaders, about how they have integrated ESG into their investment processes. While both funds are considered leaders in the ESG integration, their approaches are somewhat different.

The following page gives an overview of select archived interviews, videos, articles and papers.