Lazard Global Listed Infrastructure Equity A Acc GBP
Why is this fund on our radar?
Lazard Global Listed Infrastructure Equity offers a distinctive way to invest in essential infrastructure, such as utilities, toll roads, airports and railways, through a carefully selected portfolio of established, stable businesses. These companies typically provide services people cannot do without, which means revenues are often regulated, inflation-linked and less sensitive to economic cycles. This lends the strategy a structural tilt toward resilience, dependable cashflows and inflation protection, qualities especially valuable when markets are volatile. The managers also highlight that many of these businesses, though not all, benefit from long-term contracted cashflows, adding an extra layer of visibility.
The team applies a disciplined and valuation-led approach, selecting the infrastructure assets they believe are significantly undervalued relative to their long-term fundamentals. With a compact, highly experienced five-person investment team, decisions are based on deep sector knowledge, thorough research and long-term conviction rather than market sentiment.
The result is a differentiated, actively managed portfolio with low correlation not only to typical infrastructure strategies and the broader World Infrastructure index, but also global markets. The fund’s low correlation helps to explain why it has made it on to our list but also its strong historic performance. The Lazard fund has delivered strong absolute returns over time, but importantly those returns have been consistently above the wider infrastructure equity market and the typical infrastructure fund,, whilst also demonstrating sensible risk control. For investors seeking stable exposure to the asset class, this fund offers a modestly high yield of 4.0%, relative to 3.4% for the broader infrastructure index but also much higher than the MSCI ACWI, an index that capture global equites across developed and developing markets. We also think it provides the inflation-protected characteristics of infrastructure well, and the potential for attractive risk-adjusted returns very different to both average infrastructure funds in the market and global equity markets.
Skip to Our VerdictPerformance
Since the launch of the fund class in April 2013, the Lazard Global Listed Infrastructure Equity Fund has delivered an annualised return of 10.1%. This is noticeably better than both its own infrastructure benchmark and the average infrastructure fund*. But to help put this into more familiar context for investors, we’ve also compared the strategy with a global equity tracker – represented below by an MSCI ACWI ETF – which has returned around 11.8% annualised over the same period. In this context, the global index has been boosted by a concentrated group of very large technology companies, names that are not represented in the fund’s portfolio. Therefore, we think the fund’s performance is still impressive given its focus is on essential infrastructure, which provides investors with access to a more stable, cash-generative asset class that tends to be more resilience in the face of volatile markets.
Share class launch performance
Source: Morningstar. * The “average infrastructure fund” refers to the IA Global Infrastructure sector, a peer group used by the Investment Association to classify funds that invest primarily in global listed infrastructure. It is included here only as a broad indication of how a typical infrastructure strategy has performed.
Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future results
This long-term record has been achieved through very different market environments, and we saw a few notable periods from looking at the chart above. During the pandemic sell-off in 2020, global infrastructure fell out of favour as airports and toll roads were hit hard by travel restrictions and the fund’s main investment focus, and indeed its more value-tilted approach lagged, saw it lag the broader equity market. Utilities helped cushion some of the downside, but the fund still faced a difficult period.
The rebound in 2021, however, was equally notable. The strategy recovered strongly as traffic and economic activity normalised, with companies such as National Grid, Pennon, Severn Trent, CSX and Spark Infrastructure contributing meaningfully. Conditions were tougher again in 2022 as higher interest rates and inflation put pressure on global infrastructure businesses, though select stock-specific events, like Atlantia’s takeover, provided pockets of support. 2023 was a very strong year, helped by European operators such as Vinci and Ferrovial alongside further gains from National Grid, but 2024 proved more mixed – largely due to the fund holding less in midstream and pipeline companies during a strong period for that segment – exposure to toll roads helped offset some of that drag.
However, momentum has returned again this year, supported by US freight railroad CSX and a range of European utilities. Over the 12 months to October 2025, returns have outpaced its own benchmark and the average infrastructure fund, but importantly, the global equity ETF we’ve used above. We think this highlights one of the strategy’s key benefits for investors: it offers the potential of a more defensive and diversified return profile during global equity market pullbacks, thanks to its focus on essential infrastructure with predictable revenue streams. Whilst some short-term volatility is normal for a concentrated portfolio, the fund’s long-term record shows its ability to deliver attractive returns across very different market cycles.
Portfolio
The managers apply a highly disciplined, valuation-led process rooted in their ‘Preferred Infrastructure’ philosophy. Rather than investing in everything labelled as infrastructure, they focus only on companies that own and operate essential physical assets, benefit from stable demand and have predictable revenues, often regulated or inflation linked. These tend to be in monopolistic or highly strategic areas such as utilities, toll roads, airports and rail, whilst avoiding areas they are more sceptical of around the long-term competitive characteristics like data centres or commodity-sensitive assets, which they view to have too much competition in the market and an inconsistent ability to generate good levels of cash.
sector allocation
From an initial global universe of stocks, the managers screens leave with them with around 100 stocks that qualify for further fundamental analysis. Each opportunity is assessed on long-term cash flow visibility, balance sheet strength and fair value potential, using a required return threshold that aims to beat inflation by at least 5%. When valuations become stretched, positions are trimmed or sold, resulting in a portfolio that naturally expands or contracts depending on opportunity – typically between 25–50 holdings.
This selectivity naturally leads to meaningful industry and regional tilts. The fund has long favoured European regulated utilities and transport infrastructure, where valuations have often been more attractive than in the US, particularly in sectors like toll roads and airports. Conversely, the fund has historically been underweight US utilities when valuations looked less compelling. As at October 2025, the strategy showed a high active share of around 80%, meaning that its holdings differ meaningfully from both the broader infrastructure and global equity markets. It also offers a dividend yield of 4.0%, which is modestly above the broader infrastructure and global equity index’s yield of 3.4% and 1.7%, respectively.
regional allocation
Overall, this disciplined stock selection has delivered strong long-term results, particularly in down markets, where the combination of defensive revenue streams, strong balance sheets and valuation discipline has helped protect capital more effectively than many peers.
Our Verdict
Listed infrastructure offers a compelling blend of defensiveness, inflation sensitivity and stable income, traits that remain valuable in a world where interest rates are expected to fall, fiscal pressure on governments to increase and uneven economic growth around the world. As governments continue to rely upon private capital to modernise transport, energy and digital networks, the sector’s long-term investment case only strengthens. Yet many of the opportunities today lie beyond some of the more common parts of the infrastructure sector, includingthe traditional US pipeline and energy-transport, sector , particularly in Europe and Asia, where regulated utilities, transport concessions and energy transition assets are trading at attractive valuations.
In this context, the Lazard strategy stands out for its disciplined focus on essential infrastructure businesses with durable, and often contracted, cashflows and strong pricing power. Its selective, value-led approach has historically rewarded patience, with performance typically bouncing strongly after weaker periods. For investors looking for a differentiated way to capture infrastructure’s income and stability benefits, without overpaying, this fund offers a high-conviction, global solution with a strong track record of resilience and recovery.
Key Risks
- Focus on stable, essential infrastructure may underperform in strong growth-driven markets
- Concentrated, high-conviction portfolio can add risk
- With inflation abating, investors could expect less inflation-linked dividend growth in future
