Spotlight on Anton Eser, Chief Investment Officer, Robeco
Global Thought Leader Spotlight
Anton Eser, Chief Investment Officer, Robeco
Anton Eser is the Chief Investment Officer at Robeco and member of the Executive Committee. He is responsible for Equities, Fixed Income and Sustainability. He joined Robeco in 2025.
With nearly a century of experience and a global perspective, Robeco combines deep investment research, quantitative expertise and sustainability to deliver tailored solutions to our clients.
Concentration has reached unprecedented levels
The global equity market has become increasingly concentrated around a narrow U.S. growth engine. The U.S. now dominates global equity indices, such as the MSCI World, with a disproportionate share of returns generated by a handful of mega-cap technology companies.
While this reflects genuine earnings leadership, it has reduced diversification and increased dependence on continued A.I.-driven productivity gains and supportive macroeconomic conditions.
Valuations leave little room for disappointment
U.S. equities trade at historically elevated valuations, leaving markets increasingly sensitive to earnings disappointments, particularly if A.I. investment fails to deliver the productivity and earnings growth currently anticipated or if geopolitical and energy shocks rekindle inflation. Elevated expectations leave little room for disappointment.
Market leadership is beginning to broaden
While investors remain focused on A.I., the opportunity is increasingly extending beyond semiconductors into power infrastructure, electrical equipment, automation and digital infrastructure.
Combined with a synchronised, albeit late-cycle, global expansion, this could broaden market leadership beyond U.S. mega-cap technology.
Emerging markets, Europe, small caps and value-oriented strategies could all benefit from a wider set of economic and policy drivers.
Opportunities for sophisticated investors
Enhance portfolio diversification: There is no single solution to concentration risk, but investors can build more resilient core equity portfolios. Rather than simply blending investment styles, an increasingly compelling approach is to integrate quantitative and fundamental investing. Quantitative models identify opportunities across vast datasets, while fundamental research provides forward-looking insight, valuation discipline and economic judgement.
Systematic managers by now should have invested in their capability to have a more diversified signal set, stronger portfolio construction, richer data sources, better risk controls, dedicated NextGen research capabilities and deeper integration between quant and fundamental insights. These investments should pay off with improved resilience of the investment process and the ability to adapt to changing market environments.
Leverage the use of A.I., also in fundamental investing: For fundamental investors, A.I. is rapidly becoming a necessity rather than a competitive luxury. To remain competitive, investors need scalable processing of vast amounts of structured and unstructured information at a greater scale than traditional manual processes, allowing them to widen their research coverage and identify opportunities earlier.
Rather than replacing human judgement, A.I. augments it. As a result, fundamental investors can spend less time gathering information and more time on high-value activities such as company engagement, conviction building, and portfolio decision-making. In an environment where information advantages erode quickly, the firms that successfully integrate A.I. into their research workflows will be better positioned to generate insights, improve decision quality, and compete effectively against increasingly data-driven market participants.
Diversify sources of equity returns: Investors should complement U.S. large-cap exposure with selectively chosen, attractively valued market segments driven by different macroeconomic outcomes. Emerging markets could benefit from synchronised global growth and a weaker U.S. dollar, while Europe offers re-rating potential as policy uncertainty eases. Unloved styles like small caps, value and low-volatility broaden return drivers and improve resilience without sacrificing long-term return potential.
Anton will be presenting at Global Investment Institute’s upcoming Equities Investment Forum on Wednesday, 2 September 2026 in Melbourne CBD, Victoria. To register your interest in attending, click here or for more information email zlatan@globalii.com.au.
Anton Eser, Chief Investment Officer, Robeco
Anton is Chief Investment Officer and member of the Executive Committee at Robeco, where he is responsible for Equities, Fixed Income and Sustainability. He joined Robeco in 2025.
Most recently, Anton was CIO at 10X Investments. Before that he held several positions at LGIM and became CIO in 2016. Previously, Anton held positions at Aegon UK as head of Structured Products and Portfolio Manager at African Alliance.
He holds a Bachelor of Accounting and Economics from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.
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