Press release of April 4, 2023

SWEN Capital Partners is rethinking its business strategy to take its sustainable finance commitment even further

Faced with the urgency to act to transform the economy and championing the belief that asset management companies have a major role to play, SWEN Capital Partners is strengthening its longstanding commitment through a significant evolution of its corporate governance and investment approach in order to contribute to the emergence of a genuine sustainable finance.

SWEN Capital Partners is guided by one core principle: to invest responsibly based on objective criteria and rigorous analysis, based on the more than 10 years of sustainable investment expertise of its teams.

Although framed by a set of regulations, it is clear that the practices of players in the field of Sustainable Finance are far from being aligned. If everyone can claim to be a sustainable finance player, SWEN Capital Partners seeks to give new strength to this expression through requirements and concrete actions that materialise this ambition. Aware that this progress will be gradual, SWEN CP is committed to this path with humility but also with conviction.

SWEN Capital Partners announces today that it is reinforcing its commitment by unveiling an innovative Sustainable Finance Policy for the period 2023-2025 based on the following 4 pillars:

Pillar 1 - A new mode of governance to fully implement the ambition

• SWEN Capital Partners is setting up a governance structure dedicated to sustainable finance, notably through the creation of two new governance bodies: a specialised Sustainable Finance Committee attached to the Board of Directors chaired by Thomas Guyot, Director of Crédit Mutuel Arkéa's Products division, and an Operational Steering Committee made up of representatives from each of the company's business departments.
• The creation of an ESG veto lever on each investment opportunity.

Pillar 2 - A commitment to sustainable financial products

• The company also makes a stronger commitment concerning the products it manages, notably through a commitment to only create funds classified as Art 8 or Art 9 in the context of the SFDR for any new product launched, within the range of institutional funds.
• SWEN CP is also committed to taking a proactive approach by proposing to its clients under management mandate to evolve the selection and monitoring strategy of the investments that will integrate their portfolio in order to have a minimum of 50% of its mandates into article 8 products according to the SFDR regulation by the end of 2024 (in number or in amount).
• SWEN CP is committed to regularly proposing new impact and multi-strategy investment strategies dedicated to the major issues of tomorrow.

Pillar 3 - An ambitious climate and biodiversity policy

• The sectoral policies related to coal and oil and fossil gas (conventional and unconventional) are strengthened through new and more ambitious thresholds, deepening these policies on each of the key stages of the value chain of fossil industries and broadening the scope to include suppliers to these sectors. This includes a commitment to fully divest managed portfolios from coal by 2030 and from oil and fossil gas by 2035.
• SWEN CP is strengthening its contribution to global decarbonisation by committing to a trajectory of alignment with the Paris agreements as close as possible to +1.5° by 2050.
• SWEN CP is committed to the restoration and preservation of biodiversity through a global approach aimed at "understanding" in order to set objectives and make progress ( the diagnosis of impacts and dependencies and biodiversity footprints) and "acting" by putting in place a toolbox, including a biodiversity score for its funds, which is integrated into the decision-making process.

Pillar 4 - A commitment to support its ecosystem in this Sustainable Finance trajectory

• SWEN Capital Partners is committed not only through investments, but also through the mobilisation of its teams and its ecosystem to guide and support its clients, its investments and its partner management companies in a common virtuous path. Thus, throughout 2023, test initiatives will be launched with the aim of building a strengthened support strategy for the benefit of clients, holdings, partner management companies and the rest of the ecosystem.

The Sustainable Finance policy is integrated into the heart of SWEN CP's corporate strategy, supported by its Executive Committee and deployed by all its employees.

Jérôme Delmas, Managing Director SWEN Capital Partners
"While a company's commitment may seem very small in the face of the complexity and scope of societal and environmental issues, we at SWEN Capital Partners are nevertheless convinced that it is our responsibility to act. This Sustainable Finance Policy reaffirms our sincere desire to contribute, at our level, through a collective project and the mobilisation of each and every one of us. The organisation of the 10e edition of the ESG Best Practices Honours next June also testifies to our unfailing and long-standing commitment to our ecosystem.”

Isabelle Combarel, Deputy Managing Director, in charge of Development and Sustainable Finance
"If money is indeed a lever for change, money alone cannot do everything. This is why at SWEN Capital Partners, we have decided to commit ourselves not only through the investments we make, but also through the mobilisation of our teams and our ecosystem in order to guide our clients, our investments and our partner management companies in a common virtuous path.”

ABOUT SWEN CAPITAL PARTNERS

SWEN Capital Partners is a leading player in sustainable investment in private equity, infrastructure and mezzanine debt, with more than €7.7 billion (amount of accumulated liabilities) in assets under management and advisory, and now has nearly 100 employees. The management company, owned by the Ofi Invest group (whose main shareholder are entities of the Aéma group: Macif, Abeille Assurances holding, Aésio Mutuelle) and Crédit Mutuel Arkéa, as well as its team, has always placed the ESG & impact approach at the heart of its approach and offers its clients innovative and sustainable investment solutions. SWEN CP supports entrepreneurs and its partners in their efforts to address social, societal and/or environmental issues and to create sustainable value, which it believes is essential for useful financing.
Since January 2022, SWEN Capital Partners is co-shareholder of the NEC Initiative, a company with an independent mission and developer of a methodology allowing socio-economic actors to measure their contribution to the ecological transition towards a common goal: the construction of a responsible and sustainable economy.