SAVINGS AND INVESTMENTS
Managed by BNP Paribas Asset Management Europe, Belgian Branch
To spread the risks of your investment, our specialists select investment funds that focus on international diversification.
The Global Neutral sub-fund of the Belgian BNP Paribas B Strategy Sicav has no set duration and does not offer capital protection.
Managing a portfolio of investments requires a lot of knowledge and information, close monitoring, and good decision-making skills.
By opting for a sub-fund of the BNP Paribas B Strategy Sicav, you don’t have to your portfolio yourself. Our specialists closely monitor the fund and take action when necessary.
Flexinvest allows you to make automatic regular investments from €30 per month.
However, you can also pay in the amount of your choice and request a withdrawal whenever you want, at the applicable net asset value.
The BNP Paribas B Strategy Global Neutral sub-fund aims to achieve the best possible return while ensuring a broad distribution of risks. To do this, it invests globally via other investment funds that invest in different asset classes (equities, bonds and alternative investments).
The fund is actively managed. It can therefore invest in securities that are not included in its benchmark index. The latter is made up of the following sub-indices, in proportions that reflect the sub-fund’s risk profile: STOXX Europe 600 (EUR) NR, MSCI Emerging Markets (Free) (EUR) NR, Bloomberg Euro Aggregate Corporate (EUR) RI, Bloomberg Euro Aggregate Treasury (EUR) RI, S&P 500 (EUR) NR, €STER Capitalized et Topix 100 (JPY) RI. The benchmark index is used for performance comparison purposes, and is not suitable as a benchmark for environmental and social characteristics.
The sub-fund’s neutral weightings are as follows: 45% equities, 45% bonds, 10% alternative investments and 0% cash and money market instruments. However, managers can, depending on market conditions and their forecasts, deviate from those weightings within the following ranges: equities 25-65%, bonds 15-55%, alternative investments 0-35%, cash and money market instruments 0-60%.
The golden rule of investing is diversification. The more assets your portfolio contains, the more the risk is diversified. Managing a portfolio requires close monitoring, sufficient knowledge and information and good decision-making skills, but also strong nerves when markets are turbulent.
Investing through a collective investment undertaking (CIU) allows you to overcome these constraints with ease. You aim to achieve the potential return of a widely diversified portfolio and delegate its management to professionals whose goal is to grow your capital over the long term.
This sub-fund seeks to have environmental and/or social characteristics, paying particular attention to environmental, social and governance issues.
Among a wide universe of CIUs, managers select the funds that will enable them to implement strategic decisions in terms of portfolio composition. But not just any funds: at least 60% of the underlying funds must have obtained the Towards Sustainability label for sustainable financial products or commit to obtaining it within 6 months following the portfolio entry date. In the event that this deadline is not respected or if a fund in the portfolio were to lose the sustainability label, the non-labelled fund could be kept provided that its retention in the portfolio complies with the other limits mentioned below. A maximum of 25% of the invested assets may be allocated to funds investing in high-income sovereign bonds, as defined by the Quality Standard1 criteria of the Towards Sustainability label. These funds are subject to certain restrictions, namely that the economies in which they invest must not have obtained the label or do not meet the transparency requirements of Articles 8 and 9 of the Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR).
The other underlying funds (maximum 40% of the invested assets in the funds) are either :
* You will find more information about the Quality Standard criteria in section 2.1 Sovereign exposures, points a, b and c, of the document "Towards Sustainability initiative" available on the label's website.
At least 60% labelled funds
When the Towards Sustainability label is awarded to a fund, it means that its managers act in a socially responsible way by paying particular attention to social, environmental and governance issues in their investment decisions. Managers do this by applying the following three strategies:
Managers must apply at least one additional sustainability strategy in addition to these three strategies. For example, they must seek a higher average ESG score than the reference universe, take a "Best in class" approach consisting of favouring companies with the best ESG scores within their sector, apply a sustainable investment theme such as water, climate change or human capital, or make solidarity-based investments that provide financial support to a charity or environmental project.
The decision to invest in a Global sub-fund must take into account all of the sub-fund’s characteristics and objectives, as described in the prospectus and the key information document.
This sub-fund has held the Towards Sustainability label since November 2019. The label is regularly reassessed and constantly monitored, and is a quality standard supervised by the Central Labelling Agency (CLA). This standard defines a number of minimum requirements that sustainable financial products must meet as regards both their portfolios and investment processes. You can find more information about the label on the CLA website.
If a fund obtains this label, this does not necessarily mean that it will meet your own sustainability objectives.
This sub-fund does not provide protection against market risks, so you may lose some or all of your investment.
Credit risk: if the financial situation of an issuer deteriorates, the value of the bonds included in the portfolio may decrease.
Liquidity risk: if the market for an asset is too narrow, a lack of buyers may make it difficult to sell the asset at a fair price and at the desired time.
The prospectus and key information documents together describe all the risks involved.
A fund's risk profile is determined by the types of assets it invests in (equities, bonds, cash etc.). Risk is measured on a scale of 1 to 7, with level 1 corresponding to the lowest risk and level 7 to the highest risk. The risk indicator indicates the probability that you will incur losses in the event of market movements or if the management company is unable to reimburse you.
The risk indicator is calculated by BNP Paribas Asset Management and assumes that you comply with the recommended investment timeframe of at least 4 years.
Other relevant risks for the fund, but not taken into account by the risk indicator, are mentioned above.
Even with a modest initial investment, you can be sure that the risks are spread sufficiently thanks to extensive diversification:
If this investment fund generates profits and you have bought income units, a dividend may be paid to you. If you opt for accumulation units, you will not receive a dividend and your share of the profits will be reinvested in the fund. When you sell your units, you will recover the value of those profits (see also the "Taxation" section).
The BNP Paribas B Strategy Global Neutral sub-fund offers both types of units:
Professional withholding tax
Financial transaction tax (FTT)
This tax regime applies to private investors in Belgium and may change in the future. Other categories of investors are invited to enquire about the tax regime applicable to them.
Good to know: the BNP Paribas B Strategy Sicav may apply the "swing pricing" method to determine the net asset value (NAV) of its sub-funds. This method factors in taxes and day-to-day transaction fees – provided they do not exceed 1% of the NAV – resulting from purchases and sales of units by investors, which affect the value of the fund and all its investors.
The Global Neutral fund is a sub-fund of BNP Paribas B Strategy, a Belgian Sicav that has no set duration and offers no capital protection.
Warning: this is a marketing document. The investor should read the key information document for accumulation units, the key information document for income units and the prospectus carefully before making any investment decision. These documents are available free of charge, in French (using the links above) and in Dutch, in any BNP Paribas Fortis branch.
Useful information for investors:
Management company: BNP Paribas Asset Management Europe, Belgian Branch, a French-law company.
Financial servicing: BNP Paribas Fortis.
Units can be purchased every banking business day based on net asset value (NAV). If you buy through a Flexinvest plan, the purchase can be split up into thousandths of a unit. Net asset value (NAV) is published every banking business day on the www.beama.be website.
Complaints
Any complaint about our investment products or services should be sent by post to BNP Paribas Fortis SA – Complaints Department– Montagne du Parc 3, 1000 Brussels or by email to gestiondesplaintes@bnpparibasfortis.com.
If you’re not happy with the proposed solution, you can send your complaint by post to Ombudsfin – Financial Services Mediation Service - North Gate II, Blvd du Roi Albert II 8 (Bte 2), 1000 Brussels or by email to ombudsman@ombudsfin.be.
A summary of investors' rights is available, in French and Dutch, on the BNP Paribas Asset Management website.
