2025 Investor Sentiment Report
Forces of Change: How deal teams can thrive in an age of instability
Discover how investors are turning an era of intensified operational and strategic risks to their advantage
Today’s investors face a complex deal environment. Geopolitical instability, challenging macroeconomic factors, and rapid technological change all make spotting and capitalising on investment trends a more intricate process than even a few years ago.
However, disruption has also created new investment opportunities and certain sectors are flourishing.
We set out to explore the sentiment of global investors towards the operational and strategic risks they face today, and that they expect to face in the near future.
Using the resurgent and strategically important infrastructure sector as a lens for the wider investment environment, we asked 150 leading global investors to tell us how non-financial risks are re-shaping the deal cycle and the risk mitigation strategies that they are using to drive value creation.
Alongside our global survey we conducted deep-dive interviews with five senior investors from firms in the US, EMEA and APAC. Finally, we spoke to experts at DLA Piper, AXA XL, A&O Shearman, British International Investment and SG& Capital Partners to bring additional investment, insurance and legal insights.
Investors told us how novel operational and strategic risks have led to a gear-change in their approach to risk analysis and mitigation. With cyber security, geopolitical risk and regulatory instability now top of the boardroom agenda, non-financial risks have become increasingly pivotal to decision-making at all stages of the investment cycle – the link between effective risk management and value creation is stronger than ever.
Our report provides actionable insights into how investors are adapting to this new era of investment risk. Deal teams are leveraging both institutional knowledge and innovative tools with the aim of driving operational transformation and unlocking alpha. Our survey also reveals a mismatch between increased awareness of certain non-financial risks and under-investment in some key risk mitigation tools and processes.
