ESG and Responsible Investing

Responsible investment, including environmental, social and governance (ESG) considerations, is taken into account in the investment policies and procedures of the Summer KiwiSaver scheme.

Responsible Investment Policy

Our Responsible Investment Policy forms part of the Summer Statement of Investment Policy and Objectives (SIPO), which can be found here.

The Summer Responsible Investment Policy is split into three parts.

1. Screening of investment products

Direct investments
Before we make a direct investment into a financial product (as opposed to an indirect investment – see ‘Investments into unrelated underlying funds’ below) we a screening process to identify whether the relevant entity derives revenue from any of the following activities:

• The production of whole weapon systems, delivery platforms or components of cluster munitions; production of whole weapon systems or components of landmines and biological or chemical weapons; production of depleted uranium weapons, blinding laser weapons, incendiary weapons or weapons with non-detectable fragments (or is involved indirectly through ownership ties to companies involved in such products);
• The production of nuclear weapons, exclusive and dual-use delivery platforms capable of delivering such products, intended and dual-use components of such products, services provided for such products (or is involved indirectly through ownership ties to companies involved in such products or services);
• The production of tobacco products (including traditional and alternative tobacco smoking products);
• The manufacture or sale of automatic or semi-automatic weapons intended for civilian use.

Except as expressly noted, the screening does not extend to the sale or distribution of these products or their component parts. For example, the screen captures tobacco manufacturers but does not extend to retail distributors (e.g. supermarkets and other retailers) who sell cigarettes.

If the screening process identifies that a company derives revenues of 5% or more from the activities listed above, then no investment is made. This is done for moral and ethical reasons, i.e. we do not wish to be associated with these activities. If a fund holds a direct investment and the screening process subsequently identifies that the relevant entity derives revenues of 5% or more from one of the activities listed above, the investment will be sold in a reasonable timeframe taking into account the particular circumstances, market conditions, and the duty to act in the best interest of investors. We will apply the screening check against the funds’ direct investments at least monthly.

Where we’ve identified companies through our exclusion screening process we will place the names of these companies on an exclusion list which will be made available and updated on our website every six months.

Investments into unrelated underlying funds 
Before the Scheme invests into an underlying managed investment scheme that we do not directly manage, the Investment Manager, Octagon Investment Management will consider the responsible investment framework for that scheme. The Investment Manager will always seek to invest in underlying schemes with responsible investment frameworks comparable to the Scheme, where it can do that without compromising the Scheme's other investment objectives.

At the end of each quarter, Summer will make available on our website a list of any of the underlying scheme’s direct investments (as are available to the Investment Manager) that appear on our exclusions list as determined by our screening activities.

2. Consideration of ESG factors

For directly held Australasian securities (equities, listed property and fixed interest securities and cash and cash equivalents), the Investment Manager uses its ESG Risk Assessment framework to help identify the material ESG risks and opportunities associated with our investments.

This ESG Risk Assessment utilises data and research from various sources including Forsyth Barr’s Carbon and ESG (CESG) ratings and related methodology, LSEG Workspace controversy data, as well as information from other sources and information made available in the public domain.

The Investment Manager collates information from these sources in order to perform its qualitative assessment of the ESG risks and opportunities. The Investment Manager then determines the extent to which these risks and opportunities are considered in its investment decision making. However, ESG factors may not be determinative of the Investment Manager’s investment decisions, and the Investment Manager may include investments that have less favourable ESG ratings.

Limitation: The Investment Manager does not assess issuers of International securities as part of its ESG Risk Assessment activities.

3. Controversies

From time-to-time unexpected information about the companies we invest in may become available. If Octagon determines further investigation of the unexpectedly disclosed information is warranted, the Investment Manager’s Investment Committee will apply the following steps to determine what response and actions, if any, should be undertaken:

• The Investment Manager will investigate further by applying the Investment Manager’s ESG Risk Assessment methodology detailed above and present the information and its assessment to the Investment Committee.
• The Investment Committee will consider the information provided and determine whether the issuer’s activities are negatively flagged and / or inconsistent with a positive assessment under the assessment criteria of the Investment Manager’s ESG Risk Assessment.
• The Investment Committee will determine an appropriate action which may be

1. to note for internal reference only,

2. to note and partially or fully sell the relevant financial products,

3. to undertake (1) and advise investors via its website and/or via other media,

4. to undertake (2) and update investors via its website and/or via other media

• If partial or full divestment is to occur the investment will be sold in a reasonable timeframe taking into account the particular circumstances, market conditions, and the duty to act in the best interest of investors.

A copy of the Octagon Investment Committee Charter, detailing all of the committee’s responsibilities and activities is available on the Octagon website. 

Voting Policy

We will exercise our voting power in relation to all of the Scheme’s Australasian assets which are either held directly by the Scheme or indirectly through the Scheme’s investment in another fund managed by us (an Underlying Fund). We will vote in what we determine to be the best interests of investors in the Scheme or the Underlying Fund. We do not currently vote on proxies presented for international assets held directly by the Scheme or indirectly by an Underlying Fund. However, we require non-related, sub-delegated international investment managers to vote on our behalf and report voting activity throughout the year.

Where we appoint a related investment manager we will require the the related investment manager’s voting policy and procedures to be consistent (noting that exceptions are permitted, as decided by us, and that we reserve the right to directly instruct the related investment manager as to how to vote) with the policy described above and will require the related investment manager to provide regular reports to us on the exercise of voting power in relation to the Scheme’s assets. 

Exposure to Securities Appearing on our Exclusion List

All assets are subject to Octagon’s Negative Screening process, however, only those funds directly managed by Octagon are prohibited from investing in the issuers that appear on the Exclusion List.  Where Octagon is not the Investment Manager we detail the securities in that sub-delegated Investment Manager’s investment portfolio that also appear on our Exclusion List.

As at 30 June 2026 the Summer KiwiSaver Scheme had investments in the Hunter Global Fixed Interest Fund.

Hunter Global Fixed Interest is a fund offered by Harbour Asset Management. Harbour Asset Management as the Manager of the Hunter Global Fixed Interest Fund has appointed PIMCO Australia (PIMCO) as the fund’s Investment Manager.

At that date, the Hunter Global Fixed Interest Fund had financial exposures to entities associated with Airbus Group, Altria Group Incorporated, BAE Systems PLC, BAT International Finance, The Boeing Company, General Electric Company, Honeywell International Incorporated, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Imperial Brands Finance PLC, Northrop Grumman Systems Corporation, Rolls-Royce Holdings and RTX Corporation, companies that participated in activities identified by our Octagon's Negative Screening process and that subsequently appear on the Exclusion list (available here).

The securities issued by the companies detailed above were not specifically targeted for investment by PIMCO but are the consequence of financial hedging activities undertaken by PIMCO when managing the credit risk (the risk of default) within the fund’s portfolio of investments.

As at 30 June 2026 the Scheme had investments in the Vanguard ESG International Stock ETF.
 
At that date, the Vanguard ESG International Stock ETF had a financial exposure to Honeywell Automation India Limited, an entity associated with Honeywell International Incorporated, which appears on our Exclusion List. The ETF passively tracks an index, so the inclusion of this particular security was not a specific investment decision made by the sub-delegated Investment Manager.

Exposure to securities appearing on Octagon's exclusion list as at 30 June 2026.

*calculated as the net exposure (basis market value) of each Summer fund to the securities of companies on Octagon’s exclusion list.

We have compared the investment exposures of the Summer KiwiSaver scheme to the Human Rights Council report on Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and in the occupied Syrian Golan, dated February 2020, as well as the version updated as at September 2025, which can be found here.
Using Summer KiwiSaver scheme data as at 30 June 2026, our investigation has determined that the scheme has exposures to companies on this list through the Octagon Global Equities Fund, as well as its investments in the Hunter Global Fixed Interest Fund, Te Ahumairangi Global Equity Fund, Vanguard ESG International Stock ETF and Vanguard ESG US Stock ETF. 

We calculate the total value of these exposures to be:

The specific companies identified are listed below:

Motorola Solutions Inc Dir
Expedia Group Inc Dir
Airbnb Inc-Class A
Ashtrom Group Ltd Ord
Bank Hapoalim Bm Ord
Bank Leumi Le Israel Bm Ord
Bezeq Israeli Telecommunication Corp Ltd Ord
Booking Holdings Inc Ord
Cellcom Israel Ltd Ord
Construcciones Y Auxiliar De Ferrocarriles Sa Ord
Delta Galil Industries Ltd Ord
Elco Ltd Ord
First International Bank Of Israel Ltd Ord
Fosun International Ltd Ord
Israel Discount Bank Ltd Ord
Matrix It Ltd Ord
Mega Or Holdings Ltd Ord
Partner Communications Company Ltd Ord
Rami Levi Chain Stores Hashikma Marketing 2006 Ltd Ord
Tripadvisor Inc Ord

This is not a recommendation to buy or sell any financial product and does not take your personal circumstances into account.  We have prepared this web page in good faith based on information obtained from other sources, but we do not guarantee the accuracy of that information. We do not make any representation or warranty (express or implied) that this web page is accurate, complete, or current and to the maximum extent permitted by law disclaim any liability for loss which may be incurred by any person relying on this web page. We recommend you take financial advice before making investment decisions. We may update this page without notice.