Innovest Attracts New Equity from Europe's Largest Pension Fund

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Innovest Attracts New Equity from Europe's Largest Pension Fund

EUROPE, ENGLAND, LONDON, Jan. 28 -/E-Wire/-- ABP, one of the world's largest pension funds, announced today that it has purchased a minority equity stake in Innovest Strategic Value Advisors, a specialized investment research firm based in New York, London, Toronto and Paris. ABP, based in the Netherlands, is Europe's largest pension fund with roughly â¬140 billion in assets.

Innovest's leading-edge research and analytical models focus on such intangible, non-traditional drivers of corporate risk, competitiveness, and value as companies' performance on environmental, social, and strategic governance issues. Innovest's primary client base is major institutional investors, to whom it provides research and with whom it constructs specialized investment products. Innovest has clients in over 20 countries, and currently has some $800 million under sub-advisory relationships with a number of leading asset management partners, including ABP and State Street Global Advisors. Innovest recently announced that it is teaming with Loyalis Financial Services, a subsidiary of ABP, to launch a $150 million global sustainability fund based on its proprietary research platform, and is currently working with SSgA to create and manage an "eco-enhanced" FTSE index in the U.K.

"For us, this represents a strategic investment in knowledge capital in an area which we believe to be one of the most critical factors driving the future of fiduciary investment," said Jean Frijns, Chief Executive Officer of ABP Investments. "There is a growing body of evidence that companies which manage environmental, social, and governance risks most effectively tend to deliver better risk-adjusted financial performance than their industry peers. Moreover, all three of these sets of issues are likely to have an even greater impact on companies' competitiveness and financial performance in future. As prudent fiduciaries, therefore, we want to have a "window" on leading-edge expertise in this area. Innovest has consistently been regarded as one of the world's best, and after eighteen months of working together, they have become a logical investment partner for ABP."

"We are delighted to have a strategic investor of ABP's stature and global experience," said Innovest founder and Chief Executive Matthew Kiernan. "For us, this investment represents an important vote of confidence â not only in our particular firm, but in adding an entirely new dimension to the analysis of corporate competitiveness and shareholder value. Companies' performance in these key areas provides an increasingly robust proxy for their strategic management capabilities and agility. For us, this is one of the important directions of mainstream investing."

A second minority investment was made alongside ABP's by State Street Global Alliance, a joint venture between ABP and State Street Global Advisors, one of the leading asset management firms in the world with roughly $763 billion under management.

For further information please visit www.innovestgroup.com.

Innovest Strategic Value Advisors

Dr. Matthew Kiernan (Innovest),

(+) [REDACTED-PHONE] ext.204,

Mr. Michel Meijs (ABP),

Mr. Jay Cromarty (State Street Global Alliance),

http://www.innovestgroup.com

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