INVESTORS’ TOP SUSTAINABLE CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES

Navigating sustainable investing comes with challenges and opportunities for investors. Here’s how iShares can help.

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Capital at risk. The value of investments and the income from them can fall as well as rise and are not guaranteed. Investors may not get back the amount originally invested.

OUR APPROACH TO SUSTAINABILITY

As a fiduciary, we invest on our clients’ behalf to help them meet their investment objectives. Our focus is on understanding and managing investment risk, anticipating our clients’ needs, and supporting them in achieving their long-term investment goals.

Navigating sustainable investing

Demand for sustainable investing continues to grow as investors have moved their money into sustainable investments at six times the growth rate of traditional investments.1

We recognise there are both challenges and opportunities for investors seeking sustainable investing solutions - iShares is here to help navigate the complexity to mitigate the challenges and maximise the opportunities.

INVESTORS’ TOP SUSTAINABLE CHALLENGES AND HOW iSHARES CAN HELP

When thinking about incorporating sustainable considerations with indexing, iShares can help at every stage of your journey. Research conducted with over 400 investors2 identified the top challenges investors face when incorporating sustainability considerations into their portfolios.

CHALLENGE

How can I build an investment portfolio that aligns with my financial goals and also incorporates sustainability objectives?

How iShares can help

When you invest with iShares, you get access to the experience and expertise of BlackRock. Our role is to listen to you and provide choice. As our client, we start with you and seek the best risk-adjusted returns within the mandates you give us. From providing consultations on investment strategy and portfolio construction, to offering model portfolio solutions, trading strategies and transition management, we can help you incorporate iShares ETFs, building blocks that seek to bring transparency, liquidity and lower costs with access to sustainable investing.

PORTFOLIO CONSTRUCTION EXPERTISE

Whether you are looking to evaluate your portfolio’s holistic sustainability profile, evolve it through product substitutions or build strategic asset allocations, the BlackRock Portfolio Consulting team can help you align it with your sustainable goals.

Access ready-made sustainable portfolios

Our BlackRock Multi-Asset Portfolio ESG ETFs seek to provide a return of at least 80% in ETFs tracking indices that meet certain sustainability criteria. We have products across conservative, moderate and growth risk profiles, all built with iShares ETF building blocks.

Risk: The Fund may invest in a variety of investment strategies and instruments while aiming to be highly diversified in terms of risk and returns. The Fund is therefore directly and indirectly, through its investments, subject to the risks each of these investment strategies and instruments are subject to.

Risk: The environmental, social and governance (“ESG”) considerations discussed herein may affect an investment team’s decision to invest in certain companies or industries from time to time. Results may differ from portfolios that do not apply similar ESG considerations to their investment process.

Sustainable implementation

When you have determined the sustainable approach that works for you, BlackRock’s specialist teams can help manage its implementation.

CHALLENGE

How do I find and interpret data to assess the sustainability profile of a fund or portfolio?

How iShares can help

iShares works closely with index providers to assess the quality of data across the sustainable indices which underpin our indexed products. iShares also leverages BlackRock research, which informs our investment approach and product innovation. To seek the best risk-adjusted returns for our clients, BlackRock researches major structural trends shaping the economy, markets, and asset prices.

Risk: There is no guarantee that research capabilities will contribute to a positive investment outcome.

TRANSPARENCY, CONSISTENCY

Aladdin®, our risk and portfolio management system, integrates thousands of sustainability-related metrics from a range of third-party data providers and has established data partnerships with Sustainalytics, Refinitiv, Rhodium and Clarity AI.

Risk: While proprietary technology platforms may help manage risk, risk cannot be eliminated.

AND SUSTAINABLE EXPERTISE

BlackRock’s portfolio management team uses data in Aladdin® to assess holdings in our sustainable products at the issuer level, monitoring how this has changed and anticipating future evolutions to the indices we track.

Risk: The environmental, social and governance (“ESG”) considerations discussed herein may affect an investment team’s decision to invest in certain companies or industries from time to time. Results may differ from portfolios that do not apply similar ESG considerations to their investment process.

Compare data across sustainable indices

In addition to portfolio construction expertise, iShares can provide a full range of solutions to help investors navigate index analytics, product selection, and trading liquidity. For example, index analytics can support investors looking to incorporate sustainability considerations with their investment approach, by offering clarity on the sustainable characteristics of the underlying indices, in order to pursue the desired exposure from both a risk-return perspective and sustainability profile.

CHALLENGE

How do I find sustainable funds aligned to my needs?

How iShares can help

In light of the increased number of sustainable products on the market, investors have more choice across asset classes and sustainability strategies. Navigating the breadth of products can be a challenge to investors, and so iShares can provide investors clarity, choice and quality to help meet their sustainable goals.

CHOICE AND COMPREHENSIVE RANGE

iShares offers the ability to scale a consistent approach across the whole portfolio, with sustainable indexing alternatives in equities and fixed income across all sectors of the market from screened exposures to impact investing.

Manuela Sperandeo, Global Head of Sustainable Indexing

Navigating sustainable investing with clarity and quality

What’s under the hood matters. iShares sustainable ETFs are managed by global teams of equity and fixed income BlackRock portfolio managers.

At iShares, we look to drive innovation and enhance existing exposures by consistently engaging globally with leading index providers on behalf of our clients. For example, in 2019, we worked with MSCI to launch the first sustainable optimised strategy in EMEA through our iShares ESG Enhanced ETFs, which evolved to incorporate the EU Carbon Transition Benchmark requirements in 2021.

Our sustainable investing approach is dynamic, and we continue to innovate to reflect evolution in sustainable indexing, changing regulations and feedback and insights from our clients. iShares works with stock exchanges and market makers to develop sustainable ETF options, sustainable indexed futures and the sustainable ETF lending market, on behalf of our clients.

Investors can use BlackRock’s Sustainable Investing Platform to determine which iShares ETF and index products best aligns with their investment goals. This framework classifies iShares ETFs and index products according to four sustainable approaches.

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Screened

Constrain investments by avoiding issuers or business activities with certain environmental, social and / or governance characteristics.

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Uplift

Commitment to investments with improved environmental, social and / or governance characteristics versus a stated universe or benchmark.

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Thematic

Targeted investments in issuers whose business models may not only benefit from but also may drive long-term sustainability outcomes.

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Impact

Commitment to generate positive, measurable, and additional sustainability outcomes.

As of June 2023.

Want help navigating the range of sustainable options? The iShares product screener maps our ETFs to sustainable options. The product screener incorporates sustainable characteristics* including sustainability-related metrics and Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR) classifications, so you can filter our range to align to your needs.

*Sustainability characteristics can be viewed on the product screener when ‘Sustainability Characteristics’ is selected in the data view or individually on each product page.

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GET THE FACTS STRAIGHT ON SUSTAINABLE INDEXING

Download our guide where we debunk common myths to help you learn the facts about sustainable indexing.