Neuberger Berman is expanding its ESG platform with the addition of a new UCITS fund running the firm’s Japanese Equity Engagement strategy. 

Refinitiv has launched ESG scores for funds, allowing comparisons at the fund level for fund managers, advisers and investors, as the world of sustainable investing continues to boom.

Money market funds were the only type of fund to post an increase in net assets as well as inflows of cash in the first quarter of 2020, as coronavirus-related panic wiped 10.8 per cent off assets for open-ended funds worldwide, down at EUR47.1 trillion.

Equities markets are overvalued and expensive, if you ask asset managers. A survey this month of global fund managers by Bank of America Merrill Lynch showed that 78 per cent believe that stock markets are currently overvalued, which marks the highest level since the closely-watched survey began in 1998.

MAPFRE AM, the asset management arm of the Spanish insurance company, has announced that its range of ESG funds has so far brought in a total of EUR62 million in 2020, against the backdrop of extreme volatility in markets caused by the global pandemic.

The Nedgroup Investments Global Emerging Markets Equity Fund, which now marks its first anniversary, has been making portfolio adjustments in light of Covid-19 and is adding to its already overweight exposure to China.

Russian specialist Balchug Capital has navigated a path through the pandemic crisis by believing in the fundamental value of its “best ideas” emerging markets-focused equities positions, according to founder David Amaryan.

Sovereign wealth funds may have weathered market volatility better than feared, with new research from the International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Funds (IFSWF) and State Street Corporation highlighting that many fund portfolios were already overweight cash and underweight equities in the run-up to the pandemic crisis. 

Amundi, Europe’s largest asset manager, has reported a 7.6 per cent decline in assets under management in the first three months of the year due to “a significant negative market effect”.

Net sales of UCITS and AIFs fell by 69 per cent to EUR42 billion in February, according to the latest monthly Investment Fund Industry Fact Sheet from the European Fund and Asset Management Association (EFAMA).