NEI Investments (NEI) is a Canadian mutual fund company with a focus on active fund management. It offers three fund families to retail investors: NEI funds, Ethical Funds and Northwest Funds.[1] At the end of 2017, NEI held CAD 6 billion (€3,6 billion) in assets under management.[2]
NEI’s “Responsible Investment Policy” states that NEI excludes “from designated funds companies that derive revenue from military contracts that violate International Humanitarian Law”, including nuclear weapons.[3]
All of NEI’s assets are managed externally. The policy applies only to NEI branded funds and NEI’s Ethical Funds, which together represent approximately 66% of NEI’s assets under management.[4]
NEI does not make use of an exclusion list.[5]
We commend NEI Investments for having a policy restricting investments in producers of nuclear weapons. We recommend NEI Investments improve its policy by applying it to all externally managed assets. We look forward to engaging with NEI Investments, so a strong and comprehensively applied policy may be listed in the Hall of Fame in a future update of this report.
[1] NEI Investments, “About NEI”, NEI Investments website, (www.neiinvestments.com/pages/about-nei/), viewed 30 January 2017.
[2] NEI Investments, “PRI reporting framework 2017”, UNPRI website (https://reporting.unpri.org/surveys/PRI-reporting-framework-2017/8D19B8B1-D1C3-4FF7-8941-C64B6C398124/79894dbc337a40828d895f9402aa63de/html/2/?lang=English&a=1), viewed 23 January 2018.
[3] NEI Investments, “Responsible Investment Policy”, available at https://www.neiinvestments.com/documents/Marketing/RI%20Policy.pdf, viewed 23 January 2018; NEI Investments, written response to PAX, 2 February 2018.
[4] NEI Investments, written response to PAX, 2 February 2018.
[5] NEI Investments, written response to PAX dated 2 February 2018.
Last updated March 2018