Australian Ethical, Christian Super merger official

Australia’s leading ethical investment manager, Australian Ethical, is set to grow its already significant $6.2 billion in assets under management after formalising a partnership with Christian Super.

Australia’s leading ethical investment manager, Australian Ethical, is set to grow its already significant $6.2 billion in assets under management after formalising a partnership with Christian Super.

Flagged several months ago, Australian Ethical has signed a successor fund transfer deed with the values-based organisation that will see Christian Super’s estimated 30,000 members join Australian Ethical’s unique super product.

According to management, the growth which will add to Australian Ethical’s existing 83,066 customers will “accelerate the funds ability to pass-on benefits to all members such as fee reductions”.

The signing of the transfer deed comes after an extensive period of due diligence and is expected to be completed by early 2023 at the latest. Christian Super’s My Super product had struggled under the Your Future Your Super tests, with the Minister for Financial Services recently flagging potential changes for faith-based products.

“There will be no change to Australian Ethical’s investment philosophy or process, which will continue to be guided by its Ethical Charter,” explained the board at the same time that the company reported another reasonably strong set of financials. Excluding an institutional mandate lost to internalisation, the retail and wholesale products saw $252 million inflows for the quarter and $943 million for the financial year; a 20 per cent increase.

The result took total assets under management to $6.2 billion, a 9 per cent fall on March 2022 levels, due to the sell-off in growth equities around the world, but still 2 per cent higher than in 2021.