June, 2023
Reflecting our preference to provide new capital to existing portfolio companies, we participated in an options block trade in Wide Open Agriculture in June and then exercised those options to increase the Fund’s weighting to the stock. Wide Open Agriculture is an ethical food company that sources produce from farmers with regenerative agriculture practices. Their main consumer brands are Dirty Clean Food and OatUP and they are developing a plant-based protein to create alternative food products using lupin. During the quarter, Wide Open Agriculture made several announcements including the preliminary nutritional analysis for their lupin protein. The attributes demonstrated potentially make lupin suitable for plant-based meat alternatives, high protein noodles, and egg white replacer. They also announced expansion of OatUP distribution into NSW and Victoria, as well as advancing discussions nationally and internationally. OatUP is the world’s first regenerative and carbon-neutral oat milk. Wide Open Agriculture is well-positioned given the increasing demand for plant-based food alternatives and oat milk and as demand for their products increases, this facilitates more farmland moving to regenerative practices.
The company has identified carbon as their key measure of impact. Their key practices to sequester carbon and reduce emissions include scaling up regenerative farming practices across Western Australia; increasing access to plant-based food and drinks; eliminating food waste; and reducing emissions in transport and refrigeration. This is consistent with our Fund’s aim to reduce carbon through investing in renewable energy companies and purchasing carbon offsets equivalent to our share of portfolio companies’ emissions.
File: https://commentary.quantreports.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/june-23.jpgMarch, 2022
We participated in an equity raise for Genex Power as they required $40m in equity funding to reach contractual close on the Bouldercombe Battery Project (“BBP”), which is a 50MW/100MWh Battery Energy Storage System. It will be located next to an existing substation operated by Powerlink Queensland. An offtake agreement has been signed with Tesla which will operate the facility using their Autobidder system, guaranteeing a minimum level of revenue. Australia needs 123GWh of battery capacity to enable the phase out of coal power by 2040 which means that a BBP needs to be built each week, so it was critical that this project was funded, and our investment is directly contributing to one of the solutions to the climate crisis.
We usually avoid commenting on short-term fund performance as we focus on longterm business performance to drive returns and positive social and environmental impact. However, this quarter saw a sharp fall in the unit price due to the poor market environment for smaller companies other than resource and energy companies. As we have no investments in the energy sector other than renewable energy companies, the fund lagged the overall stock-market. The S&P/ASX Small Ordinaries Industrials Index is more representative of the sectors to which the Fund has exposure. As a result, we will show the Fund’s returns relative to this index in this report. The S&P/ASX All Ordinaries Accumulation Index remains the hurdle for the Fund’s performance fee.
File: https://commentary.quantreports.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/187084838.pdfJune, 2021
Reflecting our preference to provide new capital to existing portfolio companies, we participated in an options block trade in Wide Open Agriculture in June and then exercised those options to increase the Fund's weighting to the stock. Wide Open Agriculture is an ethical food company that sources produce from farmers with regenerative agriculture practices. Their main consumer brands are Dirty Clean Food and OatUP and they are developing a plant-based protein to create alternative food products using lupin. During the quarter, Wide Open Agriculture made several announcements including the preliminary nutritional analysis for their lupin protein. The attributes demonstrated potentially make lupin suitable for plant-based meat alternatives, high protein noodles, and egg white replacer. They also announced expansion of OatUP distribution into NSW and Victoria, as well as advancing discussions nationally and internationally. OatUP is the world's first regenerative and carbon-neutral oat milk. Wide Open Agriculture is well-positioned given the increasing demand for plant-based food alternatives and oat milk and as demand for their products increases, this facilitates more farmland moving to regenerative practices.
The company has identified carbon as their key measure of impact. Their key practices to sequester carbon and reduce emissions include scaling up regenerative farming practices across Western Australia; increasing access to plant-based food and drinks; eliminating food waste; and reducing emissions in transport and refrigeration. This is consistent with our Fund's aim to reduce carbon through investing in renewable energy companies and purchasing carbon offsets equivalent to our share of portfolio companies' emissions.
File: https://commentary.quantreports.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/175097472.pdfMarch, 2021
the most significant news across the portfolio in the March quarter was the launch of a $90m equity raise by Genex to complete the financing of the $777m Kidston pumped storage hydro project. This was followed by the announcement that the contractual close for the project had been achieved and notice issued to Powerlink under the Generator Connection and Acces Aggrement to enable work to commence on the development of the new 186 kilometre transmission line
We have been invested in Genex since the launch of the Fund in January 2017 and supported three equity capital raises by them over that time including this latest funding round. There was strong demand for this institutional placement, attracting high profile investors in reneable energy such as entities related to Mike Cannon- Brookes and Scott Farquhar
File: https://commentary.quantreports.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/171004918.pdfSeptember, 2020
The stock market continued its recovery due to the significant ongoing fiscal and monetary support. These positive drivers look set to remain for many months ahead offsetting the negative economic impacts of the pandemic. During the quarter, several portfolio companies reported developments related to scaling or extending their positive impacts. Avita Therapeutics announced the enrolment of the first patient in their pivotal study for the treatment of people suffering from vitiligo.
Around 2% of the global population are affected by the disease and, while it is not life-threatening or contagious, it can significantly impact their quality of life due to poor body image and low self-esteem. Avita is already rolling out ReCell for the treatment of acute burns and this study shows the potential to extend its usage. Genex Power is expanding into large-scale battery energy storage systems and reached agreement with Powerlink to access land next to their Bouldercombe substation near Rockhampton, Queensland for a new 50/75MWh battery project.
This is expected to be the first stand-alone largescale battery storage project in Queensland and is part of Genex's strategy to become one of Australia's market leaders in renewables and energy storage. Micro-X saw the first sales of their full-performance, digital, mobile medical x-ray imager to a number of Pacific Island nations facilitated by the World Health Organisation. The advantages of the Micro-X x-ray imager include reduced size, weight, and power usage along with the ability to be used in more rugged areas. This means that they are well-suited for use in developing nations. These developments demonstrate the ability of our portfolio companies to achieve even greater social or environmental impact over time.
File: https://commentary.quantreports.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/159469502.pdfticker: ETL6826AU
release_schedule: Quarterly
commentary_block: Array
factsheet_url:
https://www.inspireaustralianequities.com.au/
Quarterly Report
asset_class: Domestic Equity
asset_category: Australia Mid/Small Blend
peer_benchmark: Domestic Equity - Mid/Small Blend Index
broad_market_index: ASX Index MidCap 50 Index
structure: Managed Fund
manager_contact_details: Array
fund_features:
Inspire Australian Equities Fund’s investment objectives are to invest in companies with a measurable positive social or environmental impact, while seeking to generate an investment return in excess of the S&P/ASX All Ordinaries Index over the long term.
- The fund seeks to invest in companies listed primarily on the Australian Stock Exchange (“ASX”) that have a positive social and/or environmental impact.
- The purpose of the Fund is ‘impact first’. This means each company in the portfolio is selected for the positive impact that is achieved by their main business activity.