Partner Insight: Robeco fundamental equities - High-conviction strategies to target alpha

To optimise investment performance we take a data-driven approach to selecting the companies across sectors and geographies that will power economic growth in the future. Our high-conviction global equity and emerging markets strategies are managed by one of the most experienced teams in the industry and can enable you to achieve a truly global investment footprint. 

Why now?

Outperformance by US companies through the ‘Great Moderation' since 2009 has left investors with an overweight allocation to US growth stocks, especially in the technology sector. We believe retaining this overweight due to the built-in inertia of index allocation could be less than optimal in the long term. Moreover, the global economy is undergoing significant change due to geopolitical shifts, technological advancements, and demographic and environmental challenges.

In 2025 a resilient and agile investment strategy is needed to manage:

• Policy uncertainty: The prospect of sweeping trade policy changes driven by the US, with uncertain outcomes at country, sector and company level.
• The economic cycle: Risks of slowing global growth, persistent inflationary pressures, and diverging central bank actions add complexity to the outlook.
• Geopolitics: Tensions and evolving alliances in international relations create unpredictable risks and opportunities.

By investing in global equities, both in developed and emerging markets, you can gain exposure to economic growth, inflation protection, and geographic diversification, allowing you to benefit from, or mitigate, all these trends. In this new era of volatility and rapid change, active approaches that truly deviate from market indices, will make a significant difference to your investment outcome.  

Time-tested strategies

Robeco recommends a core allocation to global equities as a key component of a resilient portfolio. Robeco Global Stars Equities, our flagship high-conviction equity strategy  provides essential exposure to the global economy's main drivers through market cycles. Another exciting strategy, Robeco Emerging Stars Equities, offers exposure to favourable demographics and rising affluence in Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, Central Europe and Africa, giving you a stake in our collective global future.

Robeco Global Stars strategy has delivered annualized performance of 11.04% since it was launched in December 2008^[1], compared to the MSCI World index at 9.4%. Robeco Emerging Stars Equities strategy^[2] has delivered annualized performance of 7.60% since inception in January 2007 compared to the MSCI Emerging markets index at 4.80%.

Why invest with high-conviction?

Our high-conviction strategies aim to outperform their reference indices over a three- to five-year investment horizon. This approach results in concentrated portfolios of attractive stocks featuring a high active share and low turnover.

Only those stocks in which the investment team has the highest conviction enter the portfolio. The benchmark-agnostic and unconstrained character of our high-conviction strategies allows our portfolio managers to select stocks they consider to be attractive from a fundamental, valuation, and sustainability point of view.

As these portfolios are often contrarian and truly differ from market indices, it may take time for the investment case to develop. It's important, therefore, not only to have a high active share portfolio but also a long investment horizon. As an additional benefit, this results in lower portfolio turnover and hence lower transaction costs.

Combining fundamental investment with quant

To complement our fundamental stock selection analysis we screen our investment universe with a Robeco quantitative model to illustrate behavioural biases of market participants such as overconfidence and herd behaviour, and reveal patterns our portfolio managers may have missed. We believe this gives us another competitive advantage over passive investment strategies.

Sustainability expertise

Sustainability is integrated into stock selection with Robeco's analysts using ESG factors to provide a more holistic understanding of a company's risk profile. In emerging markets this is especially helpful to overcome low transparency, more limited governance standards, and, sometimes, lax product safety standards.

A strong and experienced global team

Robeco's global fundamental equities team consist of more than 70 investment professionals. The team cooperates closely with our China and Asia-Pacific specialists based in Hong Kong and Shanghai as well as sustainable investment analysts in Singapore and the Netherlands.  

Find out more about high-conviction equities today

^[1] Past performance is no guarantee of future results. The value of your investments may fluctuate 
Source: Robeco, MSCI. Portfolio: Robeco Global Stars Equities strategy. Index: MSCI World Index. All figures in EUR. Data end of February 2025. If the currency in which the past performance is displayed differs from the currency of the country in which you reside, then you should be aware that due to exchange rate fluctuations the performance shown may increase or decrease if converted into your local currency. Performance since inception is as of the first full month. Periods shorter than one year are not annualized. Returns gross of fees, based on gross asset value. Values and returns indicated here are before cost; the performance data does not take account of the commissions and costs incurred on the issue and redemption of units. These have a negative effect on the returns shown.