Australia Ethical Income

Overview

The Martin Currie Australia Ethical Income strategy seeks to provide a high, stable and growing income stream by investing in a diversified benchmark-unaware portfolio of high-quality, income-paying securities while accommodating for client-driven ethical values.

Our income approach is premised on the philosophy that high-quality companies that have solid earnings can sustain dividends, grow income distributions to match rises in the cost of living, and are likely to be less volatile than the wider equity market. These are key attributes of what we like to call a ‘sufficient income for life’. Our approach also aims to extract the full benefit of franking credits and maximise after tax income for 0% tax payers.

Our focus on a ‘sufficient income for life’ has resulted in an Australian equity portfolio that looks very differently to both traditional equities and other income-focused approaches.

ESG research is integrated deeply into Martin Currie Australia's multi-lensed research process and we incorporate negative ethical values screening and further ESG exclusions based on client-specific requirements. Through our experience, we have found that the inclusion of a client’s own ethical values has been complementary to our focus on high-quality companies, and thus has not compromised the objective of aiming to provide a high, stable and growing income stream.

We have over 10 years of experience in managing income strategies through very varied market cycles, including the COVID-19 impacted 2020, and we believe this shows that our unique methodologies can provide investors with a portfolio with the attributes of ‘sufficient income for life’.

We believe that there are few peer strategies available in the market that address both income and client values in the way that the Martin Currie Australia Ethical Income strategy can.