SRI fund sales hit 1 billion euro mark in December, green sales positive

Sales of European SRI funds brushed the €1bn mark in December last year as confidence in markets picked up before bottoming out again in the early months of 2009, according to the latest available figures compiled for Responsible Investor by Lipper Feri, the investment data group.
Total sales for the SRI sector for December, 2008 were €999.4m ($1.3bn) to take its overall value of to €35.4bn. Significantly, total SRI fund sales came out at 10% of the total European equity fund sales figure of just over €10bn in December, which suggests SRI fund sales are holding up well and increasing in comparison to their mainstream peers during the current economic market crisis. SRI funds typically represent around 1-2% of the total European equity fund market, which is valued at just over €1 trillion as measured by Feri. The best selling SRI fund during the month was French fund manager BNP Paribas’ Moné Etheis cash fund, which made net estimated sales of €321.2m. Second placedwas Aviva Investors Luxembourg-domiciled Sustainable Future Global Equity Fund, with receipts of €85.2m. Third was Belgian fund manager KBC’s EquiMax Eco Water 04 fund which took in €68.2m. Green funds in Europe also returned to positive sales figures in December for the first time in several months with net inflows of €181.7m, improving on client redemptions of €68.6m during November. The European green fund sector is now valued at €12.8bn. The biggest selling green fund was Aviva Investors’ Sustainable Future Global Equity Fund, which makes it into both SRI and green sectors because it meets SRI screening requirements. Second best seller was Italian fund manager Pioneer’s Global Ecology fund with new money of 49.4m. Third biggest seller was Bank Sarasin’s Investmentfonds Oekosar Equity – Global fund with inflows of €48m.
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