Robeco Smart Materials Z USD
Scarce resources, abundant investment opportunities
Share classes
Share classes
Every share class of a product invests in the same portfolio of securities and has the same investment objectives and policies. However, their parameters might deviate. For instance and amongst others, their distribution type, currency exposure or fees and expenses might differ. The most common share classes at Robeco are:
a) D/DH shares, which are regular shares and available for all Investors;
b) I/IH shares, for institutional investors as defined from time to time by the Luxembourg supervisory authority.
For more information on share classes please go to the prospectus.
Z-USD
D-CHF
D-EUR
D-USD
F-CHF
F-EUR
F-USD
G-EUR
G-GBP
I-EUR
I-GBP
I-USD
M2-EUR
Z-EUR
Z-GBP
Class and codes
Asset class:
Equities
ISIN:
LU2501123603
Bloomberg:
RBCVGJZ LX
Reference index
MSCI World Index TRN
Sustainability-related information
Sustainability-related information
Under the EU Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation, products can be labelled as either Article 6, 8 or 9 fund.
Article 6 - The fund is not in scope of enhanced sustainability disclosures compared to Article 8 and 9.
Article 8 - The fund does not have a sustainable investment objective but promotes environmental or social characteristics and is subject to enhanced sustainability disclosures.
Article 9 - The fund has a sustainable investment objective and is subject to enhanced sustainability disclosures.
Regardless of Article 8 or 9, the companies in which investments are made must follow good governance practices, and sustainable investments must not do any significant harm.
Article 9
- Overview
- Performance & costs
- Portfolio
- Sustainability
- Commentary
- Documents
MISSING: fund.detail.tabs.
Key points
- Focus on innovative materials and process technologies that help optimize the use of natural resources within scalable and efficient industrial solutions
- Investing in structural winners along the entire materials value chain including efficient and innovative materials, smart manufacturing solutions and end-of-life valorization of materials
- Strong tailwinds from decarbonization and net zero targets, government incentives for reshoring of manufacturing and sourcing, and the shift to more circular practices and sustainability
About this fund
Robeco Smart Materials Equities is an actively managed fund that invests globally in companies that provide innovative materials and process technologies. The selection of these stocks is based on fundamental analysis. The fund has sustainable investment as its objective, within the meaning of Article 9 of the Regulation (EU) 2019/2088 of 27 November 2019 on Sustainability-related disclosures in the financial sector. The strategy integrates sustainability criteria as part of the stock selection process and through a theme-specific sustainability assessment. The portfolio is built on the basis of an eligible investment universe that includes companies whose business models contribute to the thematic investment objectives. The assessment regarding relevant SDGs uses an internally developed framework, more information on which can be obtained at www.robeco.com/si. The fund also aims to achieve a better return than the index.
Key facts
Total size of fund
$ 668,888,794
Size of share class
$ 22,572,948
Inception date share class
26-07-2022
1-year performance
0.32%
Dividend paying
No
Fund manager
Pieter Busscher CFA
Mutlu Gundogan CFA
Pieter Busscher is Portfolio Manager of the Robeco Smart Materials and Robeco Smart Mobility strategies and member of the Thematic Investing team. He started at Robeco in 2007 as a Deputy Portfolio Manager for the Sustainable Water strategy. Pieter became the Portfolio Manager for Smart Materials in 2009; for Smart Mobility he had been Deputy Portfolio for since strategy launch in 2018 and took over the portfolio management responsibilities in 2021. He began his career at Credit Suisse Asset Management in Zurich in 2006. He graduated from the International Business at RSM Erasmus University (Bachelor), the Banking and Finance at the University of St. Gallen (Master) and is a CFA® charterholder. Mutlu Gundogan is Co-Portfolio manager of the Robeco Smart Materials strategy and member of the Thematic Investing team. Prior to joining in 2021, he worked at ABN AMRO – ODDO BHF as a sell-side equity analyst, covering the European Chemicals sector. Before that, he worked as a sell-side analyst at ABN AMRO and Royal Bank of Scotland covering the Materials, Industrials, and Health Care sectors. He started his career in 2003 at Kempen & Co., where he covered the Industrials, Consumer Staples, and Health Care sectors. Mutlu holds a Master’s in Business Administration from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. He is a CFA® Charterholder.
Performance
Per period
Per annum
- Per period
- Per annum
1 month
-0.43%
2.64%
3 months
-3.87%
6.58%
YTD
-1.33%
16.72%
1 year
0.32%
24.43%
2 years
6.69%
19.94%
Since inception 07/2022
6.73%
19.07%
2023
17.02%
23.79%
Costs
Ongoing charges
Indication of annual charges that are deducted for this fund. This indication is based on the costs over the last calendar year and may vary from year to year. Transaction costs incurred by the fund, any performance fees and other one-off costs are not included in the ongoing charges.
0.02%
Included management fee
A fee paid by the fund to the asset management company for the professional management of the fund.
0.00%
Included service fee
This fee is intended to cover official fees, such as the cost of annual reports, annual shareholders' meetings and price publications.
0.00%
Transaction costs
The transaction costs shown are the average annual transaction costs over the last three years calculated in accordance with European regulations.
0.03%
Fiscal product treatment
The fund is established in Luxembourg and is subject to the Luxembourg tax laws and regulations. The fund is not liable to pay any corporation, income, dividend or capital gains tax in Luxembourg. The fund is subject to an annual subscription tax ('tax d'abonnement') in Luxembourg, which amounts to 0.01% of the net asset value of the fund. This tax is included in the net asset value of the fund. The fund can in principle use the Luxembourg treaty network to partially recover any withholding tax on its income.
Fiscal treatment of investor
Investors who are not subject to (exempt from) Dutch corporate-income tax (e.g. pension funds) are not taxed on the achieved result. Investors who are subject to Dutch corporate-income tax can be taxed for the result achieved on their investment in the fund. Dutch bodies that are subject to corporate-income tax are obligated to declare interest and dividend income, as well as capital gains in their tax return. Investors residing outside the Netherlands are subject to their respective national tax regime applying to foreign investment funds. We advise individual investors to consult their financial or tax adviser about the tax consequences of an investment in this fund in their specific circumstances before deciding to invest in the fund.
Fund allocation
Asset
Currency
Sector
Top 10
- Asset
- Currency
- Sector
- Top 10
Policies
The fund is allowed to pursue an active currency policy to generate extra returns and can engage in currency hedging transactions.
In principle the fund does not intend to distribute dividend and so both the income earned by the fund and its overall performance are reflected in its share price.
Robeco Smart Materials Equities is an actively managed fund that invests globally in companies that provide innovative materials and process technologies. The selection of these stocks is based on fundamental analysis. The fund has sustainable investment as its objective, within the meaning of Article 9 of the Regulation (EU) 2019/2088 of 27 November 2019 on Sustainability-related disclosures in the financial sector. The strategy integrates sustainability criteria as part of the stock selection process and through a theme-specific sustainability assessment. The portfolio is built on the basis of an eligible investment universe that includes companies whose business models contribute to the thematic investment objectives. The assessment regarding relevant SDGs uses an internally developed framework, more information on which can be obtained at www.robeco.com/si. The fund also aims to achieve a better return than the index. The fund has sustainable investment as its objective within the meaning of Article 9 of the European Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation. The fund fosters solutions to reduce resource intensity in the economy by investing in more efficient, scalable materials that have lower emissions over the lifetime, mainly investing in companies that advance the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): Decent Work and Economic Growth, Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure, Sustainable Cities and Communities, and Responsible Consumption and Production and Climate Action. The fund integrates ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) factors in the investment process and applies Robeco’s Good Governance policy. The fund applies sustainability indicators, including but not limited to, normative, activity-based and region-based exclusions, carbon reduction target and proxy voting. The securities selected for the Sub-fund's investment universe may be components of the Benchmark, but securities outside the Benchmark may be selected too. The investment policy is not constrained by a benchmark but the Sub-fund uses a benchmark for comparison purposes. The Portfolio Manager has discretion over the composition of the portfolio subject to the investment objectives. The Sub-fund can deviate substantially from the issuer, country and sector weightings of the benchmark. There are no restrictions on the deviation from the benchmark. The benchmark is a broad market weighted index that is not consistent with the sustainable objective of the Sub-fund. The Sub-fund will use the Custom Bloomberg Climate Transition Benchmark to monitor the carbon profile of the Sub-fund.
Risk management is fully integrated into the investment process to ensure that positions always meet predefined guidelines.
Sustainability profile
ESG Important Information
The sustainability information below can help investors integrate sustainability considerations in their process. This information is for informational purposes only. The reported sustainability information may not at all be used in relation to binding elements for this fund. A decision to invest should take into account all characteristics or objectives of the fund as described in the prospectus.
Sustainability
The fund's sustainable investment objective is to help mitigate the resource scarcity challenge within industries while supporting economic growth. Resource scarcity and sustainability considerations are incorporated in the investment process by the means of a target universe definition, exclusions, ESG integration, a carbon footprint target and voting. The fund only invests in companies that have a significant thematic fit as per Robeco's thematic universe methodology. Through screening on both Robeco's internally developed SDG Framework and Robeco’s exclusion policy, the fund does not invest in issuers that have a negative impact on the SDGs, are in breach of international norms or where products have been deemed controversial. Financially material ESG factors are integrated in the bottom-up fundamental investment analysis to assess existing and potential ESG risks and opportunities. The fund's weighted carbon footprint will be equal to or better than that of its Climate Transition Benchmark. In addition, where a stock issuer is flagged for breaching international standards in the ongoing monitoring, the issuer will become subject to exclusion. Lastly, the fund makes use of shareholder rights and applies proxy voting in accordance with Robeco's proxy voting policy.The following sections display the ESG-metrics for this fund along with short descriptions. For more information please visit the sustainability-related disclosures.The index used for all sustainability visuals is based on MSCI World Index TRN.
Market development
In August, the Smart Manufacturing cluster declined slightly while Advanced Equipment saw gains, thanks to strong results from Onto. Industry 4.0 Software weakened, due to ARM Holdings, but was buoyed slightly by better earnings from Autodesk. Industrial Automation was weak, with Cognex, Yaskawa Electric and Inovance all down. The Advanced Materials cluster was down for the month. Building Efficiency gave up some previous performance gains, as TopBuild and Owens Corning were down. Resource Recovery saw slight improvements, led by ARE Holdings. Specialty Chemicals declined on news from Avantium and Syensqo. Energy Storage saw a modest increase due to a rebound in LG Chem and Samsung SDI. Transition Metals weakened slightly, with declines in Arcadium and Albemarle.
Performance explanation
Based on transaction prices, the fund's return was -0.43%. Advanced Equipment was the only subcluster in positive territory. Onto, a prominent supplier of semiconductor inspection equipment, recovered from the recent weakness following the announcement of better than expected Q2 results. The company raised its outlook for 2024 and announced significant orders for 2025. In August, the Advanced Materials cluster experienced a downturn. The Building Efficiency subcluster was the weakest performer, primarily due to TopBuild, a US insulation installation company. The company cited project delays for lower-than-expected 2024Q2 results and full-year guidance. Owens Corning, a US building materials company, also saw a decline. In contrast, the Energy Storage subcluster saw a modest increase, largely driven by improved sentiment toward South Korean battery producers LG Energy Solution and Samsung SDI, as expectations grew that the slowdown in electric vehicle demand might be nearing an end.
Expectation of fund manager
Pieter Busscher CFA
Mutlu Gundogan CFA
Strong secular growth themes related to decreased emissions (net zero targets) and more efficient materials and production techniques (e.g. smart manufacturing) are impacting their respective sectors. More specifically, efficient building materials, 3D software, the Internet of Things and robotics companies are presenting attractive investment opportunities. In the Recycling and Circular Systems investment cluster, which focuses on reusing, recycling and repurposing plastics, attractive opportunities are leading to more circular business models.