London, 28 September 2023 – Brand Finance, the world’s leading brand valuation consultancy, today announced its partnership with Legal & General Investment Management (LGIM) to launch the L&G Global Brands UCITS ETF, an Exchange-Traded Fund.
The new ETF is the first of its kind to integrate brand value. The new fund echoes business magnate and fundamental investor Warren Buffet’s belief that a company’s brand is one of its core financial assets. The ETF showcases the importance of cultivating a strong brand, acting as evidence for marketeers that positive brand valuation can help brands engage with financial audiences. This highlights the untapped potential for brands and will continue the conversation around brand valuation in the boardroom.
Between 2016 and 2022, companies within Brand Finance’s top 100 global brands list have, on average, exhibited 23% higher shareholder yield, 19% higher return on equity and 18% higher operating margin when compared to mega cap peers in the MSCI World.*
Richard Haigh, Managing Director, Brand Finance commented:
“A business’s brand is one of its most important financial assets. Used correctly, strong brands can unlock vast financial value for businesses and shareholders. Brand Finance is excited to partner with LGIM to launch this ETF and demonstrate the added value that brands bring. This will continue to reaffirm the role of brand in the boardroom.”
Aanand Venkatramanan Head of ETFs, EMEA at Legal & General Investment Management (LGIM) commented:
“From the phones in our pockets to the cars we drive, we are all familiar with brands and we have an instinctive grasp of their commercial value. We hope that the launch of this ETF will enable investors seeking exposure to such brands and companies that own them, gain access to a diversified portfolio of higher quality names that have historically demonstrated greater earnings resilience. We are pleased to partner with Brand Finance® whose research-based modelling and analysis is fundamental to this innovative and transparent investment proposition.”
*LGIM internal data as at 30 June 2023. The AUM disclosed aggregates the assets managed by LGIM in the UK, LGIMA in the US and LGIM Asia in Hong Kong. The AUM includes the value of securities and derivatives positions.
About Brand Finance
Brand Finance is the world’s leading brand valuation consultancy. Bridging the gap between marketing and finance for more than 25 years, Brand Finance evaluates the strength of brands and quantifies their financial value to help organizations of all kinds make strategic decisions.
Headquartered in London, Brand Finance has offices in over 20 countries, offering services on all continents. Every year, Brand Finance conducts more than 5,000 brand valuations, supported by original market research, and publishes over 100 reports which rank brands across all sectors and countries.
Brand Finance also operates the Global Brand Equity Monitor, conducting original market research annually on over 5,000 brands, surveying more than 150,000 respondents across 38 countries and 31 industry sectors. Combining perceptual data from the Global Brand Equity Monitor with data from its valuation database enables Brand Finance to arm brand leaders with the data and analytics they need to enhance brand and business value.
Brand Finance is a regulated accountancy firm, leading the standardization of the brand valuation industry. Brand Finance was the first to be certified by independent auditors as compliant with both ISO 10668 and ISO 20671 and has received the official endorsement of the Marketing Accountability Standards Board (MASB) in the United States.
About Legal & General Investment Management
Legal & General Investment Management is one of Europe’s largest asset managers and a major global investor, with total assets under management of £1,158bn*. We work with a wide range of global clients, including pension schemes, sovereign wealth funds, fund distributors and retail investors. Throughout the past 50 years we have built our business through understanding what matters most to our clients and transforming this insight into valuable, accessible investment products and solutions. We provide investment expertise across the full spectrum of asset classes including fixed income, equities, commercial property, and cash. Our capabilities range from index-tracking and active strategies to liquidity management and liability-based risk management solutions.
