Our Mission

Our mission is to create an inclusive environment that encourages participation of experts from pure sciences, sustainability and innovative finance; and that expands opportunities for investors to identify early enough megatrends and actionnable investments. A think tank approach enables us to understand complex subjects and get exposed to areas still overlooked by large majority of investors in public markets. Our intellectual curiousity and openness allows us to develop linkages with entrepreneurs much ahead of their cashflow breakeven points and IPOs.

Why did we start SwissThematics? Firstly, to seize an opportunity of creating synergies with the merger of science with finance. Secondly, to control our destiny, maintain ownership, innovate, and grow in ways that can rarely be achieved as part of a large organization. Being independent gives us the intellectual freedom to pursue our best ideas, and with diverse backgrounds and expertise, our investment talent is able to greatly leverage unique insights and perspectives.

Founder

Co-Founder

Scientific Advisor

Shoaib Zafar, CAIA

Shoaib is an experienced investor and equity fund manager with 13 years of institutional fund management and fundamental research experience accumulated at highly reputed international firms active in Private Banking, Asset Management and Development Finance.

Prior to founding SwissThematics, Shoaib was an Equity Portfolio Manager, managing OYSTER Global Equity Funds at SYZ Asset Management. He started his career as an Equity Analyst at Atonra Partners, a niche thematic asset manager in Switzerland

Shoaib holds a Masters’ degree in Finance from the University of Lugano (Switzerland), and is a CAIA charter holder.

A Swiss & Pakistani national, Shoaib speaks English, French and Urdu.

Francesco Carollo, CQF, CAIA, CIIA

Francesco started his career in the biotech and research field to finally embrace a 17 year financial career in Asset Management, Alternative Investments and Private Banking. He has built and led teams at reputable organizations in Switzerland and abroad.

Prior to co-founding SwissThematics, Francesco held positions of Chief Risk Officer at SYZ Asset Management, and Head of Quantitative Analysis at HSBC. He started his career at GeneProt as a Bioinformatician and also worked at CERN as a Computer Scientist.

Francesco holds a Masters degree in Computer Science from EPFL Lausanne (Switzerland), and is a CQF, CAIA and CIIA charter holder.

A Swiss & Italian national, Francesco speaks English, French and Italian.

Dr. Charles H. Dietz

Charles is a physicist and data scientist. His expertise comprise data analytics, data modeling, machine learning and AI applications for the
industry.

Charles has extensive experience as a data scientist in both AI startups and in service companies developing digital products for businesses. During his earlier academic career he has completed a PhD in experimental particle physics and then joined the field of molecular biology as a bioinformatician.

Charles holds a Masters degree in Physics from EPFL and a PhD from the National Taiwan University (NTU).

A Swiss and French national, Charles speaks English, French, German and Mandarin Chinese.

Our Process

At the onset of strong megatrends, numerous sectors and industries are undergoing transitions and transformations that will dramatically alter their fundamentals.  Every change is likely to make winners as well as losers. The key question is what to look for when identifying the best positioned companies in a fast changing and typically diverse global universe. This is where having a disciplined process, a tried and tested methodology and very importantly access to expert knowledge helps.

We define our approach as bottom-up, with solid understanding of trends in science and demographics, and a view on the macro-environment. To develop our thematic focus we leverage our network within the ‘pure science’ area and linkages with subject matter experts in respective fields. The process has clear bias towards industries with high barriers to entry and companies with solid fundamentals.

We like to cross check profitability, capital use, and balance sheet situations on our short listed candidates, and this is followed by a key point in analysis; the valuation metrics relative to company’s own historic levels and peers. We find ourselves regularly constructing old-school SWOT (Strength, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) tables and we spend time in fully understanding the relevant regulatory framework to avoid any headline and business risks.

Being green investors we have a strong commitment to save the planet and its biodiversity, This explains our bias towards companies that are most responsible and cleanest citizens in their respective industries. All of these combined; help us make an informed decision on an investment thematic and individual idea.

Our ESG Integration Into Equity Research

Our bottom-up fundamental analysis incorporates Environmental, Social & Governance (ESG) factors in the equities research.

The bottom-up process also allows detailed ESG-based adjustment of most relevant financial forecasts including revenues, returns on capital, operating expenditures and cash flows. Adjustments in company valuations are also made to reflect potential ESG impact.

In terms of research process, ESG analysis for us is a qualitative exercise albeit use of selected screenings (violations of international norms such as human rights, labor standards and environment protection). Our ESG analysis relies on internal and third-party research. These resources enable us to create individual proprietary score for environmental, social and governance issues. These are then weighted to provide company-specific aggregate ESG scores.