[GRTV] Lessons from Harbour's first 10 years

Ten years ago Harbour Asset Management set off on its investment voyage. In this video managing director Andrew Bascand reflects on the good and bad of the firm's first 10 years.

Tuesday, December 17th 2019, 4:11PM

Andrew Bascand

Ten years ago Harbour Asset Management was established and now it is one of the leading New Zealand-based funds managers.

Bascand says the firm started with two institutional clients and now it has 125.

One of the biggest trends he has seen is the growth of responsible investing (RI). While Harbour is known for as a research-based active manager it is also big on RI.

The firm joined the UNPRI when it was first established. Bascand says "back in 2009 no one was really talking about responsible investing in any strong way. That's been probably the most evident trend that's got stronger and stronger every year."

"I think it is totally embedded (now)," he says.

Harbour has a process where it rates each company, and somewhat surprisingly the most important outcomes is identifying firms that score poorly.

Bascand acknowledges how the weight of passive investments has driven the markets, but he believes this is reaching a peak and active management will become even more important.

Millennials will play an important role here, he says.

"(They are) more empathetic. They want to have stakeholder analysis. They truly want to understand where their money is heading, so they want to be more active. This is why I think we're going to have a change from passive to active."