What is an equity?
An equity is a financial instrument that makes investors co-owners of a company. Due to this co-ownership, one participates in the economic success or failure of a company. It is also associated with, for example, the right to dividends (profit distribution) or participation in the shareholders' meeting. The value of an equity depends on various factors, such as the financial situation of the company, the demand for its products or services and the general market situation.
This is, of course, a simplified explanation. There are also other factors to consider with equities (equity funds). For example, compared to other investments, a higher risk tolerance is required for equity investments.
In this case, it's good to be able to rely on experts. At Raiffeisen Capital Management, investment specialists (with longstanding expertise) analyse both, companies and equity markets and evaluate them in terms of regions, themes and sustainability.
What influence crises have on the equity markets?
Are equity investments still worthwhile? Crises have always had a direct influence on the equity markets. The video shows the crises over the past 50 years (using the global equity index MSCI World for example). As you can see, the equity market also rise again after crises. The quintessence: As an investor, you need staying power (i.e. a long-term investment horizon) and the necessary willingness to take risks when investing in equities.
Invest in equities – for example with equity funds!
Equities offer a good opportunity to build up long-term assets, diversify the portfolio and benefit from the development of various companies and sectors. This can be done easily and conveniently with the equity funds from Raiffeisen Capital Management. You also benefit from the know-how of our investment specialists. Find out more about our range of equity funds.
Investments in funds are subject to the risk of price fluctuations and capital losses.
Tip: You can also save in funds with equity funds. Further information on fund saving.
Market outlook: equities
Global equities: Neutral wait-and-see stance in the trade conflict
Our short-term equity market strategy assumed that with the escalation of the trade conflict at the beginning of the year, the equity markets would initially decline (which happened in the USA, hence the underweighting of equities in February). The expectation was that the equity market would gradually get used to the issue, especially since the trade war does not reach a dimension that would trigger a recession. Accordingly, we switched to a short-term overweighting of equities in the first week of March.
Unfortunately, the subsequent recovery in the equity market was only brief and temporary – and the next steps of escalation in the trade conflict are yet to come at the beginning of April. Even though some sentiment indicators were recently in the strongly oversold area, we cannot rule out the possibility that the equity market might take another step down in the short term before it starts a stronger recovery movement. Therefore, we are positioning ourselves for these short-term risks with a neutral weighting for the time being.
What fundamentally continues to make us optimistic (especially with regard to the entire year) are the still well-supported economic data and the favourable development of corporate profits along with the prospect of further interest rate cuts. Moreover, the longer-term outlook, particularly for Europe and China, has definitely improved in light of the recent economic stimulus packages!
You can find more information on current market developments here!
As of April 2025
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Equity funds
Raiffeisen Capital Management has more than 30 years of experience in managing equities. Choose from our wide range of equity funds.
A golden age for health care stocks?
Health care stocks are considered to be defensive investments, being less influenced by economic cycles. But anyone who thinks that this is boring or involves lower earnings opportunities is flat-out wrong. The fund Raiffeisen-Health and Wellbeing-ESG-Aktien has allowed investors to tap into the earnings potential of the health care sector for many years – in a sustainable manner!
Fund portrait on the topic of megatrends
Megatrends bring about major changes and have a lasting impact. Companies must not only recognize these trends, but also anticipate them in order to keep pace with the future. Companies that pick up on megatrends are therefore of particular interest to investors. We have even dedicated a separate fund to the topic of megatrends.
Sustainable, digital, and active investment in infrastructure equities
Equities in the infrastructure segment cover virtually the entire spectrum for investors: from promising, but unprofitable start-ups to innovative technology companies experiencing explosive growth to supposedly boring, but highly profitable firms.
Further examples of investing in equity funds
Megatrend artificial intelligence - is the hype over?
In recent years, artificial intelligence (AI) has developed into a central topic in the financial markets, driving equity prices up. However, in recent months, signs have been mounting that the hype around AI technology is diminishing. What is behind this?
Invest in US equities
Rising bond yields, uncertainties about the new Trump administration and in some cases very high valuations are creating headwinds, but parts of the US equity market still appear promising.
The funds Raiffeisen-Nachhaltigkeit-Aktien, Raiffeisen-Health-and-Wellbeing-ESG-Aktien, Raiffeisen-MegaTrends-ESG-Aktien and Raiffeisen-NewInfrastructure-ESG-Aktien exhibit elevated volatility, meaning that unit prices can move significantly higher or lower in short periods of time, and it is not possible to rule out loss of capital.
The following assessments of capital market prospects are a snapshot and may change at any time without notice or update. They represent a basic orientation framework and do not represent a generally binding view for fund and portfolio management. They also represent neither a binding forecast nor a recommendation for action for investors. The assessments of individual teams or fund managers may deviate significantly from this under certain circumstances. Similarly, the positioning of the investment funds, asset management products and portfolios may differ significantly from the market outlook mentioned on this page, for example due to different investment horizons, strategies and models used or discretionary decisions made by individual fund managers.