Dutch asset manager pulls BlackRock mandate amid sustainability push
Dutch pension fund PFZW has pulled approximately €29bn in mandates from BlackRock and Legal & General Investment Management (LGIM) in a shift towards more sustainability and actively managed players.
PFZW said it has appointed external managers best placed to carry out its revised investment policy of equally balancing market-based returns, with an appropriate risk profile and a desired degree of sustainability.
In the first half of 2024, PFZW completed the selection process of managers for its credit and equity mandates and revealed it did not renew its contract with BlackRock, LGIM and AQR in line with the new investment strategy. BlackRock previously ran €14bn for PFZW, and LGIM ran approximately €15bn.
The assets will be invested in listed equities with Robeco,, Lazard, Schroders, M&G, UBS and internally through its pension arm PGGM, according to reports.
A statement from PFZW said: “PFZW has been developing a new investment strategy where financial performance, risk and sustainability are weighed equally within the framework of a total portfolio approach.
“In collaboration with its pension fund manager PGGM, in the first half of 2024 the fund completed the selection process for managers who could take on the new listed equity and credit mandates under this Investment Policy 2030. These are the external managers listed in PFZW’s investment overviews on the website which has been updated on Sept 3rd. Part of the mandates are executed by PGGM internally. The new managers began executing these mandates in the first half of 2025.
“We have appointed external managers whom we believe are best positioned to carry out PFZW’s assignment under the Investment Policy 2030: delivering market-based returns for a good pension, with an appropriate risk profile and a desired level of sustainability. L&G and Blackrock remain valued partner for us. We’re are still in a Blackrock money market fund. L&G is managing a euro IG credit mandate and as partner in a joint venture with PGGM Private Real Estate.”
Head of mandate management Sander van Stijn added in an accompanying blog: “The redesign of the equities portfolio started with PFZW’s updated investment beliefs in 2022, which established that return, risk and sustainability should be given equal weight. This three-dimensional (3D) approach requires deliberate choices: which investments contribute to solid returns, remain within the risk budget, and improve the portfolio’s sustainability profile?”
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He explained two complementary strategies were chosen to achieve these goals: fundamental and systematic.
“Combining these two approaches gives us the best of both worlds: depth and scale, deliberate selection and broad diversification.”
van Stijn also said the group is “leaving behind our former passive strategy” where it largely followed an index containing thousands of companies”.
“As a result [of this], we were occasionally confronted with unwelcome surprises when incidents occurred at companies in our portfolio simply because they were part of the index.
“Now we have reversed the process: the benchmark is no longer the starting point but instead serves as a reference after construction. This approach is what we refer to as conscious investing. We build the portfolio deliberately, focusing on balancing return, risk and sustainability.
“In practice, this means we are reducing the number of holdings from around 3,500 to approximately 800 companies. We are taking on slightly more active risk, with tracking error increasing from 1% to 1.25%, but this is a conscious decision aimed at making the portfolio more sustainable and resilient.
“At the same time, we recognise that not every individual holding needs to achieve top sustainability scores. We set a clear minimum standard and apply strict inclusion criteria to ensure the portfolio as a whole is materially more sustainable than the broader market, while still delivering market-level returns.”
Earlier this year, The People’s Pension (TPP) – one of the UK’s largest pension funds – has appointed Amundi and Invesco to oversee large parts of its investment portfolio, with State Street side-lined as the trust prioritises “sustainability, active stewardship and long-term value creation”.