Sustainable Investment team

Our investment process

The investment process seeks to generate strong returns from investing in companies aiming to deliver profits through positive social and environmental impacts. The fund managers look at the world through the prism of three mega trends – Better resource efficiency (cleaner), Improved health (healthier) and Greater safety and resilience (safer) – and then 22 themes within these.

If a company has significant exposure to one of the themes, the fund managers verify how sustainable the rest of its activities are. For each company, the fund managers determine the ESG factors that are important indicators of future success and assess how well these are managed, via the proprietary Liontrust Sustainability Matrix.

Companies in which the fund managers invest will have robust business fundamentals with a proven ability to deliver high returns of equity (RoE) through sustaining margins and asset turnover. Typically, these companies have a maintainable competitive advantage through scale, technology or business model.

Sustainability Focus label

All 10 of the UK-domiciled funds managed by the Sustainable Investment team have adopted the Sustainability Focus label under the Sustainability Disclosure Requirements (SDR) from 1 April 2025. This makes it one of the largest ranges of funds to adopt a SDR label, covering equity, fixed income and managed funds. The Sustainability Focus label is intended for a fund that “invests mainly in assets that focus on sustainability for people or the planet”. The Liontrust funds also meet an additional key requirement of the labelling regime by investing at least 70% of their total assets in sustainable investments.

SDR labels: what they mean for investors 

In this short video, Mike Appleby explains the different SDR labels, why they are beneficial to investors and why the Liontrust Sustainable Investment team has adopted the Sustainability Focus label for the equity, fixed income and managed funds they manage.

Funds managed by the team

The Liontrust Sustainable Investment team manages a broad range of funds across equities, bonds, and managed funds.
Liontrust GF Sustainable Future US Growth Fund
Sustainable Investment Team
The Ireland-domiciled and Article 9 Fund under SFDR applies the Sustainable Future process to find the opportunities for sustainable investing in the US.
Monthly Income Bond
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund seeks to produce monthly income payments together with capital growth by investing at least 80% of the portfolio in corporate bonds.
SF Cautious Managed
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund aims to deliver capital growth, as well as some level of income, over the long term (5 years or more) through investing between 40% to 60% of the portfolio in global equities and the rest in bonds, infrastructure and cash.
SF Corporate Bond
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund invests at least 80% of the portfolio in investment grade corporate bonds denominated in sterling or hedged back to sterling.
SF Defensive Managed
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund aims to deliver capital growth, as well as some level of income, over the long term (5 years or more) through investing between 20% to 50% of the portfolio in global equities and the rest in bonds, infrastructure and cash.
SF European Growth
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund applies the Sustainable Future process to find the opportunities for sustainable investing in continental Europe and up to 5% in UK-listed stocks.
SF Global Growth
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund invests between 90% to 100% in global equities, applying the Sustainable Future process to find the opportunities for sustainable investing in developed markets.
SF Managed
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund aims to deliver capital growth, as well as some level of income, over the long term (5 years or more) through investing between 60% to 85% of the portfolio in global equities and the rest in bonds and cash.
SF Managed Growth
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund aims to deliver capital growth, as well as some level of income, over the long term (5 years or more) through investing between 60% to 100% of the portfolio in global equities and the rest in bonds and cash.
SF UK Growth
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund applies the Sustainable Future process to find the opportunities for sustainable investing in UK-listed stocks.
UK Ethical
Sustainable Investment Team
The Fund uses a thematic approach to identify the key structural growth trends that will shape the global economy of the future and then seek to invest in well run UK-listed companies whose products and operations capitalise on these transformative changes.
GF SF European Corporate Bond
Sustainable Investment Team
The Ireland-domiciled and Article 9 Fund under SFDR invests in euro denominated investment grade corporate bonds or non-euro denominated corporate bonds hedged back into euros.
GF SF Global Growth
Sustainable Investment Team
The Ireland-domiciled and Article 9 Fund under SFDR invests between 90% to 100% in global equities, applying the Sustainable Future process to find the opportunities for sustainable investing in developed markets.
GF SF Multi-Asset Global
Sustainable Investment Team
The Ireland-domiciled and Article 9 Fund under SFDR aims to deliver capital growth, as well as some level of income, over the long term (5 years or more) through investing in global equities, bonds and cash.
GF SF Pan-European Growth
Sustainable Investment Team
The Ireland-domiciled and Article 9 Fund under SFDR aims to generate capital growth by finding the opportunities for sustainable investing across Europe, including in UK-listed stocks.

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Meet the team

The team has been managing the Sustainable Future funds for over 20 years.  A key differentiator is the fact all the sustainable elements are fully integrated within a single team. The team is headed by Peter Michaelis, who was previously head of SRI at Aviva Investors and has been managing the SF funds since launch. The team joined as part of Liontrust’s acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments (ATI), and were previously running the Sustainable Future fund range at Aviva Investors. The other lead equity managers are Simon Clements (who was formerly head of global equities at Aviva Investors) along with Martyn Jones and Chris Foster, who joined the management training programme at ATI as graduates. Fixed income investments are managed by Kenny Watson (formerly at Ignis Asset Management), Aitken Ross and Jack Willis who also started their careers in the graduate scheme at ATI, and Connor Godsell. Harriet Parker leads on engagement activities across the team.

 

Peter Michaelis

Peter Michaelis

Peter Michaelis is head of the Sustainable Investment team, having joined Liontrust in 2017 as part of the acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments, where he was head of investment. Peter has been managing money in Sustainable and Responsible Investment for over 20 years.

Simon Clements

Simon Clements

Simon Clements is a fund manager who joined Liontrust in 2017 as part of the acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments, where he had managed funds for five years. Prior to this, Simon spent 12 years at Aviva Investors (previously Morley Fund Management) where, most recently, he was head of global equities.

 
Martyn Jones

Martyn Jones

Martyn Jones joined Liontrust April 2017 as part of the acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments (ATI) and became a fund manager in 2019. Martyn spent five years at ATI, initially as a graduate trainee and then as an analyst with the Sustainable Investment team.

Chris Foster

Chris Foster

Chris Foster is a fund manager who joined Liontrust in 2017 as part of the acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments (ATI). Previously, Chris joined ATI through the management training programme after graduating with a First-Class Honours

Mike Appleby

Mike Appleby

Mike Appleby is an investment manager on the Liontrust Sustainable Investment team, with responsibility for the generation and integration of sustainable and responsible investment (SRI) research into the funds and portfolios.

Harriet Parker

Harriet Parker

Harriet Parker is an investment manager on the Liontrust Sustainable Investment team with responsibility for identifying sustainable and responsible companies with attractive valuations. She joined Liontrust in 2017 as part of the acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments.

Kenny Watson

Kenny Watson

Kenny Watson is a fund manager who joined Liontrust in April 2017 as part of the acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments, where he managed funds for more than three years. Previously, Kenny was at Ignis Asset Management for 15 years, specialising first in UK smaller companies,

Aitken Ross

Aitken Ross

Aitken Ross is a fund manager who joined Liontrust in 2017 as part of the company's acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments. Aitken started his career on the Alliance Trust Management Training programme in September 2010

Jack Willis

Jack Willis

Jack Willis is a fund manager, having joined Liontrust in 2017 as part of the company's acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments. Jack started his career on the Alliance Trust Management Training programme in September 2014 after graduating with First Class

Connor Godsell

Connor Godsell

Connor Godsell is an investment manager who joined Liontrust in November 2023 as part of the Sustainable Investment team. Connor started his career at Aberdeen Investments where he gained seven years industry experience working on the Rates & Inflation desk,

Mingming Huang

Mingming Huang

Mingming Huang joined Liontrust in June 2019 on the Sustainable Investment Equities team as a Portfolio Assistant Manager, providing analytical support for the team’s thematic analysis and engagement.

Deepesh Marwaha

Deepesh Marwaha

Deepesh is an investment analyst, having joined Liontrust in September 2021 on the Sustainable Investment fixed income team. Deepesh graduated from the University of Strathclyde in Economics and Human Resource 

Nancy Kondelidou

Nancy Kondelidou

Nancy is an investment analyst, having joined Liontrust in September 2021 on the Sustainable Investment fixed income team. Prior to this, she worked for a year in a fixed income data related role. 

Ed Phelps, Trainee Sustainable Investment Associate

Ed Phelps

Ed is an investment analyst, having joined Liontrust in 2021 on the Sustainable Investment equities team. Ed previously completed an internship in the Responsible Investment department at Redington.

Sarah Nottle

Sarah Nottle

Sarah is an investment analyst, having joined Liontrust in 2021 on the Sustainable Investment Equities team. Prior to this, she worked within the asset management industry in an operations role. 

Linnea-Bengtsson

Linnea Bengtsson

Linnea Bengtsson is an equity analyst who joined Liontrust in 2023 as part of the Sustainable Investment team. Linnea previously worked at Ninety One Asset Management (formerly Investec),...

Hannah Muir

Hannah Muir

Hannah Muir joined Liontrust in 2017 as part of the company's acquisition of Alliance Trust Investments. Hannah joined the Sustainable Investment fixed income team as an analyst, producing sustainability analysis reports.