Ninety One has announced it will merge its UK Sustainable Equity fund with its Global Sustainable Equity fund in 2025, subject to shareholder resolution.
The move will see a reduction in the number of UK equity funds the business will run from five to three, and means the UK Sustainable Equity fund will no longer exist in its current form. Similarly, the firm’s UK Smaller Companies fund will also be merging with the UK Special Situations fund in the first half of 2025, subject to investor approval.
Launched in 2018, the Ninety One UK Sustainable Equity fund was designed as a strategy that contributed to a more sustainable future through investment in UK companies, as well as delivering outperformance of its benchmark over the long term. It is run by Matt Evans (pictured).
In a statement, Ninety One said: “We regularly review our funds to ensure that they continue to offer investors the very best of our long-term investment management expertise. We can confirm that the UK Sustainable Equity fund will be merging with the Global Sustainable Equity fund in the first half of 2025, subject to a favourable resolution passed by investors.
“The receiving fund, which has a similar approach to sustainability and is supported by the same investment team, benefits from a wider range of investment opportunities geographically. Our broad Sustainable Equity capability remains strong and offers solutions used by a variety of institutional and advisor-led asset owners.”
Ninety One’s Global Sustainable Equity fund is co-managed by Stephanie Niven and Miles Hamilton, who have been running this fund since March 2022 and November 2023 respectively. The fund invests in companies across the globe, with its level of investment in the UK much lower than the UK Sustainable Equity fund. For example, at the end of October 2024, it had just 6.1% of its assets invested in UK-listed companies.
Evans will continue running the UK Sustainable Equity fund until the fund merges, and will then remain with the business, conducting research as part of the sustainable equity team.
Responding to the news, Hargreaves Lansdown decided to remove the Ninety One UK Sustainable Equity fund from its Wealth Shortlist, with Joseph Hill, senior investment analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, adding that their conviction in the UK Sustainable Equity fund “has largely laid with its manager Matt Evans, who we think is a committed and passionate sustainable investor”.
Given the fund will no longer be available to invest in its current form in due course, or be managed by Evans, Hill concluded it was right to remove the fund from Hargreaves Lansdown’s Wealth Shortlist.
