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Worldwide Leaders
The Worldwide Leaders strategy launched in November 2013 and transitioned to become a dedicated sustainability strategy in October 2016.
Investment objective and strategy
The Fund aims to achieve long term capital appreciation and sustainably invest in companies which both contribute to, and benefit from, sustainable development, achieving positive social and environmental sustainable outcomes. The Fund invests primarily in a diverse portfolio of equity securities or equity-related securities of larger capitalisation companies which are listed, traded or dealt in on any of the regulated markets worldwide.
The Worldwide Leaders strategy launched in November 2013 and transitioned to become a dedicated sustainability strategy in October 2016. The strategy invests in 30-60 high-quality global companies that are particularly well positioned to contribute to, and benefit from, sustainable development.
Leaders simply means that this strategy is focused on companies with a market cap value of at least USD5 billion.
Strategy highlights: a focus on quality and sustainability
- Companies must contribute to sustainable development. Portfolio Explorer >
- We invest in high-quality companies with exceptional cultures, strong franchises and resilient financials. How we pick companies >
- We avoid companies linked to harmful activities and engage and vote for positive change. Our position on harmful products >
- Our approach is long-term, bottom-up, high conviction and benchmark agnostic
- We focus on capital preservation as well as capital growth – we define risk as the permanent loss of client capital
Latest insights
Quarterly updates
Strategy update: Q3 2024
Worldwide Leaders strategy update: 1 July - 30 September 2024
We initiated a position in one new company during the quarter. Rentokil Initial (United Kingdom: Industrials) is a global leader in pest control services, a necessary and critical health and hygiene service to secure homes, hospitals and businesses against disease and damage.
Its business model is fundamentally local in nature and generates lots of cash through resilient, recurring sales. The management team is focused on growth by increasing the density of its route network, and so driving improvements in profitability and earnings.
During the quarter we sold completely out of four companies as we grew concerned about their ability to grow their end customer markets. These include: Midea (China: Consumer Discretionary) which makes home appliances for the Chinese market; Infineon Technologies (Germany: Information Technology) which makes semiconductors for electric vehicle and renewable energy markets; Hamamatsu Photonics (Japan: Information Technology) which makes equipment to generate, detect and filter light for scanners, x-ray machines and automation devices such as barcode readers; and Graco (United States: Industrials) which specialises in paint sprayers and products that manage corrosive and other difficult-to-handle fluids.
We are always looking at new companies and recently visited Sweden to meet with some new and some old businesses, including Atlas Copco (Sweden: Industrials), the world's leading manufacturer of air compressors, which is held in the strategy. The opportunity to meet with company management on their ‘home turf’ is invaluable; it is much easier to get a sense of how culture and people have shaped a company and its future return profile when sitting within their offices; or, in the case of Atlas Copco, 20 metres below their office in a test mine. We continue to find excellent investment ideas by focussing on the impact that outstanding people can have on businesses with strong franchises and resilient financials.