Responsible Investing

Engagement

We firmly believe that it is in the best interests of our clients to be responsible in our approach to investment.  As active managers of focused portfolios, we aim to engage with the management of all the companies we own on a regular basis. The purpose of such engagement is to ensure that management objectives and expectations are closely aligned with the investment goals of our clients. Please see our full Engagement and Voting Policy. 

Proxy Voting

TT uses leading proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services for our proxy voting requirements and hence comply with their proxy voting policies. We also actively vote on all issues on every stock that we own. Whilst we are guided by ISS in this regard, we will always vote in what we believe is our clients' best interests. Our voting records for calendar year 2022 can be found here, while our voting summary for the 12 months ending December 2023 can be found here. Statistics for company engagement and voting disclosures are shown below:

Proxy Voting Statistics Q1 2024

Environmental, Social and Governance

We believe that investing in companies with strong and/or improving ESG metrics will help to produce superior long-term risk-adjusted returns for our clients. Consequently, we analyse the ESG risks and indeed opportunities associated with every potential investment in our long-only portfolios.  For more detail on how we do this, please see our full ESG Policy. Please also see our latest Stewardship Report. Importantly, our Head of ESG has remuneration targets reflecting the inclusion of a sustainable risk analysis framework within our investment approach as a firm. Our Analysts and Portfolio Managers in turn have explicit KPIs related to following TT’s investment processes. These processes include the incorporation of ESG risks and opportunities in their investment research. 

We have been a signatory to the UN PRI since 2016 and file an annual transparency report with the UN PRI where we summarise our ESG policies and practices. In 2023, we maintained our 5-star rating from the PRI for “Direct - Listed equity - Active fundamental” with a score of 94, and we were pleased to see our active ownership practices and ESG integration continue to rank ahead of our peers. We also formally support the Task Force on Climate‐related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and have done extensive research on biodiversity, which culminated in our biodiversity engagement guide. Moreover, we have joined the TNFD Forum, a consultative group of institutional supporters that will make available global, cross-sector expertise to support the work of the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD). We are also a member of the Association of Institutional Investors (API), Russia’s leading association of institutional investors. Finally, we are compliant with the Local Government Pension Scheme Advisory Board’s Code of Transparency and are a signatory to the UK Stewardship Code.

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TT is carbon neutral

We are a certified carbon neutral organisation, having independently measured and offset our carbon footprint by funding several tree planting and renewable energy projects in the developing world. 

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Philanthropy

We are proud to have achieved the Charities Trust Bronze Payroll Giving Quality Mark Award, celebrating TT’s efforts to foster a culture of philanthropy and committed giving in the workplace. 

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Awards and Certifications

We are proud to have been awarded the following recognitions for our work in ESG:

  • TT Environmental Solutions won the ESG Investing award for ‘Best ESG Investment Fund: Global Thematic’ in 2022 and 2023
  • Environmental Finance Sustainable Investment Award for ‘Best Thought Leadership Paper on Sustainable Investing, Global’ in 2022
  • Responsible Investment Association Australasia (RIAA) certification TT Environmental Solutions strategy (TT recognised as a Responsible Investment Leader by RIAA (top 20% of 272 investment managers))


An introduction to ESG investing at TT with our Head of ESG, Basak Yeltekin.

“ESG is considered systematically at TT.  ESG cannot succeed where it doesn’t speak the language of investment and our portfolio managers and analysts know that it is an important contributor to performance.”

In this short video, Basak discusses how she has developed the process and framework for ESG integration across all of TT’s long-only strategies and her significant impact on TT’s approach to ESG.  She also details the notable ESG differences between EM and DM companies and how, as a boutique asset manager, TT can impact corporate behaviour through our high levels of engagement. Finally, Basak touches on where she sees the future of ESG investing, both at TT and in the wider industry.