RobecoSAM Global Gender Equality Equities IE EUR

Audrey Kaplan is Portfolio Manager and member of the Global Equity team. She is responsible for fundamental global equities with a focus on gender-based investing and on consumer goods, and portfolio construction. She joined Robeco in 2021. Previously, she was Head of Global Equity Strategy at Wells Fargo Investment Institute (NY). Prior to joining Wells Fargo, she worked as Head of International Equity Team and Senior Portfolio Manager at Federated Investors, Inc. (NY, now known as Federated Hermes). She also held roles in European research at Merrill Lynch International (London) and in Asian research at Salomon Brothers, Inc. (Tokyo) earlier in her career. She holds a Master's in Finance from London Business School and a Bachelor’s in Computer & Systems Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Michiel Plakman is Lead Portfolio Manager and member of the Global Equity team. He is also Co-Head of Robeco’s Global Equity team. He is responsible for fundamental global equities with a focus on SDG investing and on companies in the information technology, real estate & communication services sectors, as well as portfolio construction. He has been in this role since 2009. Previously, he was responsible for managing the Robeco IT Equities fund within the TMT team. Prior to joining Robeco in 1999, he worked as a Portfolio Manager Japanese Equities at Achmea Global Investors (PVF Pensioenen). From 1995 to 1996 he was Portfolio Manager European Equities at KPN Pension Fund. He holds a Master's in Econometrics from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and he is a CFA® Charterholder.

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.

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.

The fund incorporates sustainability in the investment process by the means of a target universe definition, exclusions, negative screening, ESG integration, and voting. The fund invests at least two-thirds in companies that have a Gender Equality score of 50 or higher and only invests in companies with positive or neutral SDG scores based on the internally developed SDG Framework. The fund also applies a negative screening to exclude the 20% worst ESG scoring stock issuers from the investable universe and does not invest in stock issuers that are in breach of international norms or where products have been deemed controversial as per Robeco's exclusion policy. Financially material ESG factors are integrated in the bottom-up fundamental investment analysis to assess existing and potential ESG risks and opportunities. 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.

As we head into the final two months of the year, there is not much for investors to cheer about as equities continued to sell off across regions, with Europe leading the decline. In October, global equity markets declined (-2.7% in EUR), the third consecutive monthly loss in a row, with nearly all style factors (e.g. growth, value, dividend payers, momentum) and 10 of the 11 sectors closing in the red, utilities (+0.6%) being the exception. Consumer discretionary, energy, industrials and healthcare all dipped more than 4%. Several items drove losses across multiple asset classes, including rising geopolitical risk. Especially due to the Israel-Hamas war there are wider concerns for the region along with escalating fears about the impact of rising rates on the broader economy. US Treasuries lost ground for the sixth month in a row and the S&P has not experienced three months of losses in a row since the pandemic turmoil of March 2020.

Based on transaction prices, the fund's return was -1.58%. The portfolio strongly outperformed the MSCI World Index in October despite an overall negative absolute return. This was driven mainly by strong stock selection across almost every sector, but especially in healthcare, consumer discretionary, materials and financials. Our barbell laser focus over the past several months on defensive, high-quality companies on the one hand and high-growth value creation companies on the other hand strongly aided performance this month. Stock selection and sector allocation combined drove over 100 bps of alpha. However, stock selection within the technology sector was a detractor from performance, despite our best performance coming from our largest holding, Microsoft, which continues to beat on all cylinders, confirming its quality safe-haven status and its top weight in the portfolio.

Airplanes have soft landings, but historically, the economy rarely does. In September 2023, the median projection for the Fed funds rate was to end 2023 at 1% versus the 5.3% we achieved and held at the latest FOMC meeting. The bond market has not sounded recession alarms for this long in at least six decades. While there are some signs that recession risks have eased, such as inflation trending lower, high nominal and real interest rates globally will certainly increase refinancing risks in the next year.