BNY Mellon Investment Management has added an emerging market debt impact fund managed by Insight Investment to its global funds range.
Responsible Horizons EM Debt Impact Fund looks to invest in securities and issuers that will have a positive impact across three themes – people, planet and prosperity – in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals and EU Taxonomy.
The fund, which will mainly invest in impact bonds, will use Insight’s impact assessment framework as well as the firm’s proprietary ESG ratings system, Prime, and be benchmarked against the JP Morgan EM Green, Social and Sustainable Bond Index Diversified (USD hedged).
Matt Oomen, global head of distribution at BNY Mellon Investment Management, said: “Drawing on Insight’s impact assessment process, this fund meets the rising demand for impact-oriented capital investment in emerging markets.”
Portfolio manager Simon Cooke (pictured), who leads the fund, added: “Investors serious about impact cannot ignore emerging markets. They face some of the most pressing environmental and social challenges globally. They also offer an increasingly diversified, rapidly growing impact universe, particularly within the corporate debt space. We seek to identify what we believe to be the ‘best ideas’ from that universe to combine a structural yield premium with scope to deliver long-term positive change”.
This is the latest Responsible Horizons fund to launch on the BNY MGF platform for European investors. It follows the Responsible Horizons Euro Corporate Bond Fund, which has more than €1bn in assets under management, as of 31 December 2022, and the Responsible Horizons Euro Impact Bond Fund, which launched in January 2022.
The fund is registered for sale in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, UK, Switzerland and Spain.
Look out for an analysis of sustainable emerging market funds in ESG Clarity’s upcoming digital magazine.
