Talking Heads – What’s new in thematic investing? Check out our Barometer

Talking Heads – Thematics Barometer with Christopher Dunn

Daniel Morris: Hello and welcome to the BNP Paribas Asset Management Talking Heads podcast. Every week, Talking Heads will bring you in-depth insights and analysis through the lens of sustainability on the topics that really matter to investors. In this episode, we’ll be discussing the 2025 Thematics Barometer. I’m Daniel Morris, Chief Market Strategist, and I’m joined today by Christopher Dunn, Head of Investment Management for Europe for Coalition Greenwich. Welcome, Christopher, and thanks for joining me.

Christopher Dunn: Hi, Daniel. Thank you for having me.

DM: Let’s start with some basics. Can you tell us a bit about what Coalition Greenwich is and then more about the 2025 Thematics Barometer?

CD: Coalition Greenwich is a research-based consultancy and one of our main areas of expertise is in asset management. We work with asset managers on a range of business strategies. But we also do a lot of custom research looking into specific trends in the market. And that’s the type of research that we’re discussing today, the Thematics Barometer 2025. Several years ago, we got together: Coalition Greenwich, the asset management part of in Paribas as well as the corporate and investment banking arm. We crafted a questionnaire to get our arms around some of the leading trends in the thematic space. This is our fourth year. We went out to virtually the same constituents that we sought in previous years. We went to Europe, Asia as well as North America and we had a mix of institutional investors and wholesale distributors that responded to the survey. These are relatively senior decisionmakers taking portfolio-level decisions. We conducted 180 different interviews that make up the sample of this study.

DM: So, share with us some of the headline outcomes. Have you noticed any changes in the results?

CD: What’s been interesting to see over the past couple of years is a real evolution and a maturation of the thematic space. We have 88% of participants say that they have a familiarity with thematic investing. Traditionally, on the wholesale side, we had 95% that were familiar. It’s still kind of coming up the curve when it comes to the institutional investor side. Another interesting aspect of this survey when we asked about their current asset allocation and how they were deploying thematic strategies in their portfolio. Traditionally, equities is the homestay of thematics. But it’s been interesting to see the development and the acceptance of private market thematic strategies as becoming on a similar footing with equities. We could say pretty solidly now that investors see private markets as a primary vehicle. Another thing to point out, we ask a direct question about objectives: why are you deciding to invest in a thematic strategy? Over time, we’ve seen consistent and strong feedback that investors are choosing to invest in thematic strategies because it’s a means by which they can achieve their sustainability and impact goals.

We see a bit of a flip this year. In previous years, the second place was always about the absolute return. It’s taken the first place this year. That bleeds into a broader discussion about sustainability more generally. We are at a more evolved place than we were several years ago where investors are looking much more to empirical proof and more quantitative outcomes. Investors when looking at thematic investing are coming back to basics and thinking about the performance potential of the particular strategy they signed up. That being said, impact and sustainability outcomes still remain a key driver. One last thing I would add, we asked specifically about trends or the themes that really matter to investors. On the sustainability side, renewable and clean energy continues to be the leading sustainability theme. Another thing that’s been interesting to see over time is the onset of artificial intelligence. We added it to the survey a couple of years ago as a standalone as we saw this whole trend unfolding. And it’s really off the page in terms of demand and interest from investors. So, in a nutshell, those are the some of the big trends that we saw in the research.

DM: Of course, we appreciate a fairly significant change in the political environment in the US compared to when you would have done this survey last year. Do you see an impact in your results or are there other regional differences you’d like to highlight?

CD: Consistently through the research, you see Europe as the leader in terms of thematics adoption and innovation. It’s becoming more nuanced, but it’s still strong. It’s interesting to look at Asia where they’re coming up the curve in terms of familiarity and, and interest. They’re the growth area in the research. When it comes to the North American sample, there was a big drop-off in terms of familiarity and interest. The political environment has had an impact on demand for or familiarity with thematic investing. A lot of that is because there is a clear affiliation between thematic investing and sustainability. You’ve seen a considerable backtrack on sustainability in the North American space, particularly in the US. As a result, it’s kind of a knock-on effect that you see this decline in interest.

DM: What does the survey tell us about the outlook for thematic investing?

DM: The research is clear that there’s a really healthy expectation of growth in the thematic space. We see that most demonstrably in equities. As I indicated earlier, the private markets trend is really exciting. That’s also expected to increase in the future. Another thing that I would point to, we ask a specific question about their perceptions of short-term outperformance of thematics versus long term. In the past we had strong short-term performance expectations. It’s become more nuanced, particularly all around the regions. It’s interesting to see the longer-term expectations of performance have remained consistent year-on-year. This asset class is becoming more standardised in portfolios. Investors are starting to look at it as a much longer-term solution.

DM: Christopher, some of the new things you highlighted from this year’s survey was an increase in interest in private market thematic strategies and also a change in the priority for investor objectives with a focus on enhancing returns becoming predominant. In terms of key themes that you see among thematics on the sustainability side, renewable and clean energy, and outside of ESG topics, the importance of artificial intelligence. Well, thank you very much for joining me.

CD: Thank you so much for having me.

DM: That’s it for this week’s episode of Talking Heads.
If you would like more information on our capabilities and thematic strategies, please reach out to your BNP Paribas Asset Management contact or check out Viewpoint, our website for investment insights at viewpoint.bnpparibas-am.com. If you would like to see the full 2025 Thematics Barometer survey, you can check out the BNP Paribas Asset Management corporate site at www.bnpparibas-am.com. We recommend subscribing to Talking Heads on your favourite podcast channel such as YouTube or Spotify. You’ll receive your podcast episodes every week. If you like Talking Heads, leave us a positive review and a nice rating. You’ve been listening to the BNP Paribas Asset Management Talking Heads podcast with me, Daniel Morris, and Christopher Dunn from Coalition Greenwich. Please do join me next week. Until then, take care.