At Zevin Asset Management, we build responsible investment portfolios for our clients. We then address risks and create positive social impact by engaging with portfolio companies. As 2020 draws to a close, it is clearer than ever that three of the most pressing environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues facing companies (and society) are COVID-19, racial injustice, and climate change. Our advocacy helped to move companies toward better practice in each of these areas.
2020 Year in Review
Philip Hergel
Senior Quantitative Analyst
2020 Can't End Fast Enough
Imagine if the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s, the 1930s Great Depression, the nightmarishly messy U.S. presidential election of 2000, as well as unprecedented devastation from global natural disasters all occurred in the same calendar year — well, they just did.
2020 will be remembered as the year to forget. It will be remembered for the 1.4 million people (and still counting) who died globally due to COVID-19. It will be remembered as the year of brutal economic turmoil for millions of people who lost their jobs during the pandemic. It will be remembered for the immeasurable anguish of Black people being killed by police officers and the increasing awareness of the Black Lives Matter movement across America. It will be remembered for the uncontrollable raging wildfires around the world and the most active hurricane year on record. It will be remembered for the attack on American democracy as the presidential election results were disputed, litigated, and doubted by millions of Americans. There is no negative adjective strong enough to describe how bad 2020 was. If 2020 were a drink, it would be a colonoscopy prep. Good riddance 2020…bring on 2021!
To read more download a PDF of our Year in Review.
Giving Tuesday 2020
Q3 2020 Audiocast
Steven Dray, senior portfolio manager and chief investment officer, breaks down our perspective on performance and market outlooks as we enter the fourth quarter of 2020:
Q3 2020 Impact Update
At Zevin Asset Management, we build responsible investment portfolios for our clients. We then address risks and create positive social impact by engaging with portfolio companies. In the third quarter of 2020, we continued challenging companies for accountability and positive change on environmental destruction and deforestation, labor standards, and racial justice.
Honoring Hiroshima & Nagasaki by working to de-fund the military-industrial complex
This month we remember the United States bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki 75 years ago. On August 6 and August 9, 1945, those cities were destroyed, instantly killing or injuring at least 200,000 people. The bombings scarred the lives of the survivors, the hibakusha — many of whom succumbed to related diseases years later and the last of whom mark this anniversary with us. The bombings also shaped the last 75 years of global politics and forced us to question our belief in a positive future for humankind.
Q2 2020 Newsletter
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INVESTMENT COMMENTARY
The sustainability of the recent stock market recovery looks tenuous given the many economic and market risks. We continue to face rising COVID-19 cases around the world, while the timing and availability of a vaccine remain uncertain. In addition, rising tensions between the U.S. and China, trade disputes between the U.S. and E.U., and the November election outcome all pose further risks to our economic system.
Due to these uncertainties, we will tread cautiously and remain defensive until risks and rewards seem more in balance. We are positioned in high-quality, large-cap stocks that should weather the uncertainty of the next year. For our clients in balanced accounts, given declining rates, we have deployed some cash and Treasury funds into a more diverse portfolio.
Our defensive stock positioning, which helped in the first quarter, had the opposite effect in the second quarter. Given the strong recovery we saw in the stock market, Zevin Asset Management’s portfolios that have a mix of equities and fixed-income assets underperformed. However, on the equity side, we had solid stock selection across several sectors and our bias to the largest companies and domestic stocks drove our equity performance. Stock selection was strongest in Emerging Markets and weakest in Europe. A few of our ecommerce companies benefited from the shut-down of physical stores and social distancing. Our underweight in the Financials and Utilities sectors continued to benefit performance this quarter while our underweight in the Consumer Discretionary sector was a drag. Looking forward, we believe better opportunities may exist in international and the more cyclical sectors, hence we are increasing our research effort in these areas.
For a more in-depth discussion of our thoughts on the second quarter, listen to this audiocast.
PERFORMANCE OVERVIEW
Please see the disclosures included in this PDF.