Status under the EU Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR)

Janus Henderson Pan European Small and Mid-Cap Fund

Legal Entity Identifier: 213800R7Z49EGZAA3508

A. Summary

The Fund is categorised as one which meets the disclosure provisions set out in Article 8 of SFDR as a product which promotes environmental and/or social characteristics and invests in companies with good governance practices, but does not have as its objective sustainable investment.

The Fund promotes climate change mitigation, avoiding issuers with a high carbon intensity and which do not have a credible transition strategy based on the Investment Manager’s proprietary methodology nor meet the Investment Manager’s alternative criteria on engagement or ESG Rating, and support for the UNGC Principles (which cover matters including human rights, labour, corruption, and environmental pollution). The Fund also seeks to avoid investments in certain activities with the potential to cause harm to human health and wellbeing by applying binding exclusions.

The Fund does not use a reference benchmark to attain its environmental or social characteristic.

This Fund seeks a combination of capital and income returns through investment in pan European smaller companies equity markets.

The Investment Manager uses specific screens to help achieve some of the promoted characteristics. For example- to promote climate change mitigation, screens are applied to avoid investment in certain high carbon activities, and it is expected that this will result in the fund having a lower carbon profile. Another example is that to promote support for the UNGC Principles, screens are applied so that the Fund does not invest in issuers that are in breach of the UNGC Principles based on third party data and/or internal research.

The Investment Manager applies screens to exclude direct investment in issuers based on their involvement in certain activities. Specifically, issuers are excluded if they derive more than 10% of their revenue from oil sands extraction, arctic oil and gas, thermal coal extraction, or tobacco. Issuers are also excluded if they are deemed to have failed to comply with the UNGC Principles (which cover matters including human rights, labour, corruption, and environmental pollution).

The Fund also applies the Firmwide Exclusions Policy (see “Firmwide Exclusions” in the "JHI Responsible Investment Policy”), which includes controversial weapons.

For the purposes of the AMF doctrine, the extra-financial analysis or rating is higher than:

1. 90% for equities issued by large capitalisation companies whose registered office is located in "developed" countries, debt securities and money market instruments with an investment grade credit rating, sovereign debt issued by developed countries.
2. 75% for equities issued by large capitalisations whose registered office is located in "emerging" countries, equities issued by small and medium capitalisations, debt securities and money market instruments with a high yield credit rating and sovereign debt issued by "emerging" countries.

The Investment Manager may invest in issuers with a high carbon intensity¹ (other than those excluded as described above) if it determines that such issuers have a credible transition strategy, based on its proprietary methodology described below or the Investment Manager’s alternative criteria on engagement or ESG Rating.

In accordance with the Investment Manager’s proprietary methodology, a company will only be considered as having a credible transition strategy if it has at least one of the following:

• a science-based emissions target or a verified commitment to adopt a science-based emissions target (approved or verified by SBT- https://sciencebasedtargets.org/ or equivalent); or
• a climate score of B or higher (score from CDP – https://www.cdp.net/en , or equivalent ); or
• 30% of future gross capital expenditure and/or research and development to sustainability aligned projects, in accordance with the Investment Manager’s methodologies.

If a company does not currently have a credible transition strategy in place, the Investment Manager may still invest if:

1. it believes that, through its engagement with the company, the company will adopt a science-based emissions target or carbon reduction goal*; or
2. it demonstrates superior ESG risk management by achieving an ESG rating of AA or higher (rating from MSCI – https://www.msci.com/, or equivalent).

^*If the company does not achieve a “pass” rating within 24 months, it will divest and screens will be applied to exclude the issuer.

Additional criteria may also be applied in assessing the validity of the transition strategy.

The Investment Manager may only invest in companies that would be excluded by the screens described above if the Investment Manager believes, based on its own research and as approved by its ESG Oversight Committee, that the third-party data used to apply the exclusions is insufficient or inaccurate.

The Investment Manager may consider that the data is insufficient or inaccurate if, for example, the third-party data provider research is historic, vague, based on out of date sources, or the investment manager has other information to make them doubt the accuracy of the research.

If the Investment Manager wishes to challenge the third-party data then the challenge is presented to a cross-functional ESG Oversight Committee who must sign off on the “override” of the third-party data.

If a third party data provider does not provide research on a specific issuer or excluded activity, the Investment Manager may invest if, through its own research, it is satisfied that the issuer is not involved in the excluded activity.

JHI has chosen MSCI’s as its primary data source for ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) research.

Where coverage gaps are identified, specialist ESG Data vendors or inhouse research may be used to complement the ESG research. This ensures helps ensure that consistent data and methodologies are used given an ESG measure per security type and hence can be compared correctly in the portfolio construction process.

The JHI Responsible Investment Policy, which incorporates JHI’s Sustainability Risk Policy, sets out the firmwide approach to ESG Integration Principles, including JHI’s Responsible Investment Principles for long-term investment success, our approaches to Stewardship and Engagement and Baseline Exclusions applied to investee companies.

¹High carbon intensity refers to the 10% of highest emitting companies in the Western Europe (INC UK) stocks below EUR11bn market cap and a lower bound of EUR1bn.