Dubai: In line with their global peers, UAE investors are more attuned with the socially responsible way of investing, and are more aware than ever before.
According to a study conducted by Schroders, about 86 per cent of the investors in the UAE say that sustainable investing has become more important to them over the past five years.
Even globally the trend is catching up. About 72 per cent of the investors who are aged between 25 and 34 are interested in sustainable investments, compared to 48 per cent in the corresponding age group of more than 65 years.
“It is very encouraging to see UAE investors have higher inclination towards ESG investments and this is something we believe would become a very integral part of how client looks at an asset manager and how they allocate their monies to them,” Nisarg Trivedi, director at Schroders Investment Management, told Gulf News.
UAE investors are still attracted to thematic investment themes such as health care and the data economy. In fact, UAE investors are more interested in health care (72 per cent) in comparison to the global average (66 per cent). The same can be said for the data economy with 66 per cent of UAE investors interested compared to 59 per cent globally.
One more concept that investors are interested are the income funds, which could wade off the current volatility roiling the markets.
“The financial markets across the world had a very bumpy 2018 and as we go into 2019, the challenges remain the same and we expect volatility to increase. Investors in UAE have seen multiple market cycles and should understand that they should alter their returns expectation in line to what markets are. As per the survey, there is a gap of 8.5 per cent between investors’ expected returns in UAE in the next 5 years, compared to what markets actually generated in last 5 years,” Trivedi said.
