The archive · Product Ideas · Product decision · 2024–2025
DEGIRO's Pink Chip turns women-led companies into an index — and it outperforms
Broker DEGIRO and UN Women launch the first stock index of women-led companies — 14,500+ new investors in two weeks, shares up 6.7%.
DEGIRO · UN Women Netherlands · AKQA
What it had to solve
Women-led companies were systematically undervalued by investors, and gender equality was mostly treated as charity rather than economics. DEGIRO, Europe's largest investing platform, wanted to make the investment case for female leadership concrete — and give its users something meaningful to buy.
How it works
DEGIRO, Europe's largest investing platform, and UN Women Netherlands shared an observation: companies run by women were consistently undervalued by markets, yet the evidence showed they performed at least as well — often better. The inequality was usually framed as a social issue; AKQA's idea was to reframe it as an economic one.
Together with data partner Thematic, they built the Pink Chip Index — a world-first family of indices tracking the financial performance of women-led companies against global benchmarks. Named by analogy with 'blue chip,' it let anyone measure and invest in female leadership as an asset class rather than a cause.
The index launched on International Women's Day at the Euronext Amsterdam stock exchange and was listed on DEGIRO for retail investors. A launch campaign of social and outdoor media drove people to the site, where they could see the data and open positions in the constituent companies.
The product performed: within two weeks the index had attracted 14,500+ new investors and its constituent shares rose 6.7%, later climbing a further 9.48% while outperforming market benchmarks. Pink Chip became 2024's most awarded creative work — Grands Prix at Cannes (Glass Lion), Eurobest (Glass and Innovation) and more, with roughly $6B in estimated economic growth.
Why it lands
- It converted a social argument into a financial instrument — the market itself became the messenger for women's leadership.
- The thesis was testable: because it was an index, claims about performance were measurable, auditable and lived in real market data.
- It gave ordinary investors a role: buying the index was an investment decision that also advanced equality, not a donation.
- Naming it 'Pink Chip' inverted a cliché — pink as weakness — into an asset class that outperformed.
What it did
Within two weeks of launch: 14,500+ new investors, a 6.7% rise in the share price of constituent companies, 2M+ impressions and 70,000 site visitors; the index later climbed a further 9.48%, consistently outperforming benchmarks, with roughly $6B in total economic growth. It won the Cannes 2024 Glass Lion Grand Prix and Eurobest 2024 Grands Prix for Glass and Innovation.
What you can take
To change how people value something, give them a product, not a plea: a tradeable index converted a social argument into an investment opportunity the market had to take seriously.
Since then
Pink Chip became the most awarded creative work of 2024, with three Grand Prix and eight Golds across Cannes Lions (including the Glass Lion Grand Prix), Eurobest (Glass and Innovation Grands Prix), LIA and the Lovies. The index kept climbing — a further 9.48% after the launch surge — and AKQA, DEGIRO and UN Women continued to publish the performance case for women-led companies, giving investors a durable instrument rather than a one-off campaign.
Sources
- UN Women NL and DEGIRO Pink Chip — work case
- Pink Chip honoured with two Grand Prix awards at Eurobest
- Eurobest announces its Grands Prix, Special Awards and Young Creatives Competition winners for 2024
- Courage, curiosity and perseverance — 2024 reflections
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