Green and SRI fund sales hit hard by credit crisis

Both green themed and SRI funds suffered a significant month of client outflows in September, mirroring the general market drawback from equity funds as a result of the credit crisis, according to the latest available figures compiled for Responsible Investor by Lipper Feri, the investment data group.

The green sector recorded client redemptions of €616m ($748m) over the month, easily cancelling out a slight rally in August when they took in €64m. The total universe of green themed funds is worth almost €17.9bn.
Sales of SRI funds, which differ from their green peers by undergoing socially responsible screens, were similarly impacted in September losing €1.1bn in assets from a total universe of just over €40bn. That contrasted with positive SRI fund sales in August of €418.1m for the sector. Both green and SRI fund sales are expected to be worse for October when the credit crisis really began to bite hard. The poor fortunes of SRI and green funds in September mirrored that of the broader European equity funds market, which lost €24.6bn over the month to finish at just over €1.4 trillion.Dutch fund manager SNS Reaal’s ASN Milieu & Waterfonds was one of a small number of green funds to record double digit sales figures for September, topping the chart with €22.6m in new money.
It was followed in second place by French manager BNP Paribas’ Parworld – Environmental Opportunities fund which took in €18.2m and by Société Générale’s Equities Europe Environment fund which pulled in €15.4m in new client money. The largest green fund is BlackRock’s New Energy Fund with just over €3bn in assets. In the SRI bracket, Dutch private bank Van Lanschot’s Orange SeNSe Fund was top seller at €70.9m of new money. It was followed by Swiss manager Lombard Odier’s tie-up with Generation Asset Management, the LODH Horizon The Generation Global fund, which took in new assets worth €42m. Third best seller was Dutch manager Fortis’ France domiciled Money Prime Euro SRI fund which recorded inflows of €38.5m. The largest SRI fund is currently Société Générale’s SGAM Invest Monetaire ISR fund with just over €1.5bn in assets.

See downloads (left bar) for Feri/RI green/SRI fund charts