A 15-minute watch. 

As part of our ongoing Octo Selectors Series, Legal & General Investment Management’s head of retail multi-asset Justin Onuekwusi came into our studios to talk about ESG, late-cycle investing and managing costs. 

Acknowledging the challenge of embracing ethical investing for asset managers, Justin spoke about the balancing act of meeting client’s individual needs on ESG, yet still having scale and being able to commoditise an offering.

He says: “The challenge with ESG is that it is very difficult right now to understand where we are going to be in the future and what people’s requirements are going to be for ESG. Everybody has different individual requirements, so it’s difficult to meet that demand.”

The interview also touched upon where Justin and his team are seeing value in equities – Japan and the UK – and why the “psyche of investing” needs to change at the latter stages of a bull market, when the best returns are often made.

He remarks: “Between 2009 and 2017, there was a period of extremely low volatility. What we saw in 2018 was just a normalisation of volatility, not excess volatility. But look how people got spooked out by it.”

Justin also stresses his view that the only guarantee in fund management is that costs will detract from returns year after year – which is why they need to be managed so carefully.