U Ethical Australian Equities Trust - Retail

Product Name	U Ethical Australian Equities Trust - Retail
Issuer	U Ethical
Category	Investment
Type	Fund or Trust
Target	Retail
Certified Since	2005

Asset Classes	Australian only equities
Markets	Australia
Investment Approaches	Negative Screening, Positive Screening
It Includes:	Education Green property Healthcare and medical products Renewable energy and energy efficiency Social and sustainable infrastructure Sustainable water More sustainable companies
It has some level of screening for:	Armaments Fossil fuels Gambling Predatory lending Tobacco
It fully excludes:	Alcohol Animal cruelty Human rights abuses Labour rights violations Nuclear power Pornography
Broker	Responsible Returns
URL	https://www.responsiblereturns.com.au/investment-options/u-ethical-australian-equities-trust-retail/profile

Overview

The U Ethical Australian Equities Trust has been developed for the long-term investor, and aims to outperform benchmark after fees over rolling 5-year periods. It invests primarily in Australian shares and listed property trusts, as well as up to 10 per cent in fixed interest and cash.

Description

U Ethical’s investment process ensures that all investment decisions are in keeping with our vision and that they promote careful financial stewardship. This is achieved through the application of positive and negative screens, ESG integration, alignment with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals and engagement with companies—together with a focus on competitive economic returns and sustainability.

Positive screening
Our positive screening seeks out companies that promote human welfare and dignity or environmental sustainability. Examples include companies producing goods or services that enhance the health and welfare of individuals and communities as well as companies producing goods or services that protect our environment. We screen positively for sectors such as:
• Clean energy and technology
• Sustainable agriculture
• Circular economy
• Employment
• Community and education services
• Health care.

Negative screening
Our negative screening evaluates a company’s products, services and practices to ensure they are not detrimental to society or the environment. U Ethical avoids investing in companies that:
• cause unacceptable damage to the natural environment;
• infringe on human rights;
• support oppressive regimes;
• cause or perpetuate injustice and suffering; and/or
• have unacceptable occupational health and safety practices.

Our screening approach means we systematically exclude the following industries due to their inherent negative impacts:
• Fossil fuels (coal, oil & gas)
• Uranium mining and nuclear
• Defence and weapons (civilian, conventional and controversial weapons)
• Predatory lending
• Gambling
• Adult entertainment
• Animal cruelty
• Alcohol production
• Tobacco production.

However, we recognise that there are occasions when companies inadvertently violate these principles and make genuine efforts to rectify this. Furthermore, we generally do not exclude a company where a contravention of the principles constitutes less than 5% of the company’s revenue or earnings. In such instances, the contravention may be outweighed by significantly positive factors.

Performance results

Product holdings

Product documentation

Supporting documents

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The products featured on this site have all achieved certification under the Responsible Investment Association Australasia’s (RIAA) Responsible Investment Certification Program.

Transparency & Verification

What sets these investment products aside from regular ones on the market is they all have some type of responsible or ethical strategy applied to them.

At a minimum, their issuers explain these strategies in public documents and open their offices and books to third party verifiers who check these strategies are implemented according to what you read about them publicly.

You can also click through to see the underlying managers and / or stock holdings in each certified product as well as access a certified product’s recent performance results.

Stewardship & Impact

In July 2019, we lifted our requirements of certified products which we are phasing in over 18 months.

We now require that issuers have organisation-wide commitments to responsible investing and they exercise their responsibilities as stewards of your money - through engaging with companies to improve sustainability performance and voting on shareholder resolutions where possible. All certified products now need to at least avoid significant harm and their issuers will annually report against any sustainability-based claims made by their products. This uplift in program standards is part of our passion for, and on-going commitment to, responsible and ethical investing.

Even though we're lifting the bar, we know your convictions to doing good with your money may be higher and so we have served up our member's certified products with a large dose of transparency and independent verification, so that you can draw your own conclusions from reliable information and choose investments that best suit your individual needs.

*Information Disclosures

While all reasonable efforts are undertaken to ensure information and links on site are current there may be instances where information and documents are updated during the course certification (eg. PDS, Fact Sheet). Certified product issuers are required to update this information as soon as possible on the Responsible Returns site, but there may be some extenuating circumstances impacting timeframes.

The certification program may also assess information provided for certification based on proposed future changes to a responsible investment process that is in-line with Responsible Investment Association Australasia’s (RIAA) Responsible Investment Certification Program criteria. In such instances, members are similarly required to update this information on Responsible Returns within an agreed future timeframe. Old document versions may be reflected on site until this process is finalised.

U Ethical Australian Equities Trust - Retail

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