Marta Martins from IM Gestão de Ativos is our Fund Selector of the Month

Marta Martins was born of the 11th of April 1983 in Lisboa and hold a master’s degree in Economics from Universidade Nova de Lisboa.

She started to work in the financial markets in 2006, at GNBGA (former asset manager of Banco Espirito Santo) within the Multimanager team, as a fund analyst and later on as a fund selector and a fund manager of balanced portfolios. Then in February 2022, she joined IMGA as responsible for the fund selection team and as portfolio manager of the most aggressive profile of the balanced portfolio’s range.

1. What made you decide to go into the financial sector? Did you have any other vocations?

Immediately after finishing my degree in Economics, I started to work as a junior analyst at a consultancy firm. However, a few months later I was giving the first steps into financial markets when I integrated the Multimanager team of ESAF (the asset manager of Banco Espirito Santo, now named GNBGA -  Grupo Novo Banco Gestão de Ativos)) as a fund analyst. I have never had a special interest in the financial sector, but the dynamics involved in my daily life in terms of not only understanding the behavior of financial markets but also being able to work as a team in finding the best way to position portfolios or generating ideas, were quite an appealing feature for me.

2. How should investors orient their portfolios in this environment?

Currently, there are a variety of unknowns and question marks, whose evolution will affect the market’s performance in many different ways. Therefore, in my opinion, it becomes important to add flexibility to the portfolios with strategies that can adapt to different market environments. Choosing active strategies and managers with a consistent and proven track records in generating alpha will be, in my opinion, key as the market becomes more fundamentally driven and dispersion remains high.

3. How is the relationship with your clients in times of market crisis? How do you manage emotions?

Managing clients' emotions and expectations is always a big challenge, especially in times of market crisis. Above all, it is important to communicate clearly, regularly, and with robust reasoning, and not to speculate or create unreasonable expectations. When interacting with clients, I believe it is important to be humble and shows empathy about their needs and fears but demonstrates that these periods of crisis are not rare in financial markets and often represent a good investment opportunity, that a professional should be able to exploit.

4. What differences do you observe in the way new generations invest?

I would say that overall new generations are more aware of the financial markets. This combined with much easier access provided by the proliferation of online banking and digital platforms, resulted in more and more young people starting to invest in the financial markets. 

On the other hand, this easy and quick access has been translating so far into investment horizons that are shortened (more trading), with the new generations being more focused on stocks and other risky assets like cryptocurrencies. Overall, they seemed to be less risk averse vs previous generations.

5. If you had to define yourself with 3 words, what would it be and why?

I would define myself as being:

- Passionate and curious about new things and ideas. I am always open to new perspectives, approaches, and ways of thinking;
- Persistent about my ideas;
- Team player, since I believe that value creation is maximized when you work together for the same goal but with different mindsets.

6. What are your hobbies?

Outside of work, being a mother of twins fulfills most of my time. I have always liked to spend time in nature and doing outdoor activities. Reading and, less often than wanted, traveling to new places and meeting different cultures are also things that I love to do.