How we invest your money
Ethics and our unit trust range
Acting responsibly, honestly and with integrity is a key part of our tradition as a co‑operative society.
The Co‑operative Group leads the way in responsible business practices and in 2008, we were voted the UK's most ethical brand*. In the area of investments, ethics similarly plays a part in everything we do.
Our unit trusts are managed by our team of over 50 Manchester-based investment professionals. They have managed retail funds for around 20 years, and now have over £19 billion (as at 30/4/08) under management on behalf of all clients.
When choosing companies to invest in, most fund providers just analyse the financial performance of a company. We are the only UK fund manager to also analyse social, ethical, environmental and other company management issues (eg 'fat cat' pay) across all the funds we manage.
We believe that this gives us an edge to potentially produce superior returns since we have a more rounded and informed view of a company's future prospects, as we show in the table.
We apply this approach to the UK Growth, UK Income with Growth, Sustainable Leaders and Corporate Bond Income Trusts.
In addition, our Sustainable Leaders Trust takes this one step further by avoiding companies involved in areas such as nuclear power generation, tobacco, armaments and pornography, among others that do not meet our strict criteria.
| Issues to consider when analysing companies for investment | The Co‑operative Investments | Most other providers |
|---|---|---|
| Management team |  |
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| Business strategy | |
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| Financial performance | |
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| Competitive advantage | |
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| Industry trends & changes | |
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| Environmental impact | |
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| Employee impact | |
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| Supplier & trading policies | |
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| Board structure | |
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| Risk management | |
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| Executive salaries & bonuses | |
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Please note that the investment processes used by other providers do vary. This diagram is intended to show an example of the differences between The Co‑operative Investments' responsible investment approach and other investment processes.
*Source: The GfK NOP Ethical Brands Survey 2008 was conducted in the UK, covering a total of 3,000 respondents from March to April 2008.
If you would like to find out more about how we invest responsibly please read our guide (this will open in a new window).
- Responsible investing (opens as PDF 1.0Mb)
