Fund Filters
Sustainability
Environmental policy
Sustainability policy
Encourage more sustainable practices through stewardship
Climate Change & Energy
Coal, oil & / or gas majors excluded
Climate change / greenhouse gas emissions policy
Fracking and tar sands excluded
Fossil fuel reserves exclusion
Require net zero action plan from all/most companies
Paris aligned fund strategy
TCFD reporting requirement
Encourage transition to low carbon through stewardship activity
Fossil fuel exploration exclusion - direct involvement
Fossil fuel exploration exclusion – indirect involvement
Human Rights
Modern slavery exclusion policy
Social / Employment
Favours companies with strong social policies
Responsible mining policy
Mining exclusion
Ethical Values Led Exclusions
Ethical policies
Tobacco production avoided
Armaments manufacturers avoided
Alcohol production excluded
Gambling avoidance policy
Pornography avoidance policy
Civilian firearms production exclusion
Banking & Financials
Predatory lending exclusion
Governance & Management
Governance policy
Avoids companies with poor governance
Encourage board diversity e.g. gender
UN sanctions exclusion
Encourage higher ESG standards through stewardship activity
Fund Governance
ESG integration strategy
Asset Size & Metrics
Over 50% large cap companies
Invests mostly in large cap companies
How The Fund Works
Negative selection bias
Focus on ESG risk mitigation
SRI / ESG / Ethical policies explained on website
Labels & Accreditations
SFDR Article 8 fund / product (EU)
Intended Clients & Product Options
Faith friendly
Intended for investors interested in ESG / sustainability
Available via an ISA (OEIC only)
Fund management company information
About The Business
ESG / SRI engagement (AFM company wide)
Responsible ownership / stewardship policy (AFM company wide)
Responsible ownership policy for non SRI funds (AFM company wide)
Vote all* shares at AGMs / EGMs (AFM company wide)
Diversity, equality & inclusion engagement policy (AFM company wide)
Boutique / specialist fund management company
Integrates ESG factors into all / most fund research
In-house diversity improvement programme (AFM company wide)
Offer unstructured intermediary sustainable investment training
Resources
In-house responsible ownership / voting expertise
Use specialist ESG / SRI / sustainability research companies
ESG specialists on all investment desks (AFM company wide)
Collaborations & Affiliations
PRI signatory
Climate Action 100+ or IIGCC member
GFANZ member (AFM company wide)
Investment Association (IA) member
Accreditations
UK Stewardship Code signatory (AFM company wide)
PRI A+ rated (AFM company wide)
Engagement Approach
Regularly lead collaborative ESG initiatives (AFM company wide)
Engaging on climate change issues
Engaging with fossil fuel companies on climate change
Engaging to reduce plastics pollution / waste
Engaging to encourage responsible mining practices
Engaging on biodiversity / nature issues
Engaging to encourage a Just Transition
Engaging on human rights issues
Engaging on labour / employment issues
Engaging on diversity, equality and / or inclusion issues
Engaging on governance issues
Engaging on responsible supply chain issues
Climate & Net Zero Transition
Encourage carbon / greenhouse gas reduction (AFM company wide)
Net Zero commitment (AFM company wide)
Working towards a ‘Net Zero’ commitment (AFM company wide)
Carbon transition plan published (AFM company wide)
‘Forward Looking Climate Metrics’ published / ITR (AFM company wide)
Carbon offsetting – do NOT offset carbon as part of net zero plan (AFM company wide)
In-house carbon / GHG reduction policy (AFM company wide)
Publish 'CEO owned' Climate Risk policy (AFM company wide)
Net Zero - have set a Net Zero target date (AFM company wide)
Voting policy includes net zero targets (AFM company wide)
Transparency
Publish full voting record (AFM company wide)
Publish responsible ownership / stewardship report (AFM company wide)
Full SRI policy information on company website
Full SRI policy information available on request
Net Zero transition plan publicly available (AFM company wide)
Sustainability transition plan publicly available (AFM company wide)
Process
All of Troy's mandates are populated from Troy’s central investment universe. ESG factors are integrated within our bottom-up fundamental analysis which is applied to all of Troy’s strategies. Our aim is to evaluate how these factors can either help or impede a company’s ability to generate sustainable returns and affect its revenue growth, profitability, asset value and valuation over the long term. To achieve this, we combine in-depth stock specific analysis with thematic ESG research.
Troy carries out its own in depth primary research and place significant emphasis on meeting with companies. We judge each company on its individual exposures to ESG factors, aided by third party research and our own materiality analysis. This means we are less reliant on opaque quantitative ESG scores or third party research that may be influenced by greenwashing. We do not have a prescriptive checklist for assessing ESG factors, instead our focus remains specific to each company, industry and our view of their materiality.
In practice, ESG analysis is embedded in our in-house research notes and forms part of our monitoring process during meetings and reviews, which is particularly important given the dynamic nature of materiality. Governance and climate risk are systematically reviewed as part of the annual AGM voting process. Stock specific ESG integration also informs our engagement and voting activities where we feel a company is performing inadequately on a material ESG factor.
As part of our investment research and monitoring process, ESG risks are considered alongside other types of risk such as business risk, financial risk and valuation risk. Where we believe ESG factors pose a material and probable risk to the sustainability of returns, we may choose either not to invest or to invest with a greater margin of safety by using engagement to mitigate the risks. We would seek to avoid investing in a company that is exposed to ESG risks which we consider to be intolerably high, particularly where our analysis reveals that such risks are not adequately managed and may impair our ability to generate good risk-adjusted returns for our investors. Our equity selection has remained absolutely focussed on quality companies.
We conduct thematic research on systemic ESG risks and opportunities to better understand issues that affect a number of our holdings or to explore the exposure of our portfolios to significant and material ESG themes. This is particularly useful when developing our understanding of rapidly evolving social and environmental factors. Our thematic research often allows us to identify leaders and laggards on a given ESG topic, and guides our understanding of best practice against which individual companies may fall short. Thematic research also helps direct proactive engagement activities aiming to encourage the adoption of best practice, for example in relation to plastics, supply chain labour risk and climate change.