At a recent climate-finance meeting attended by Wall Street giants including BlackRock Inc. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc., no one spoke until a lawyer had finished reading out a disclaimer stating the group was not a cartel. The newly formed ritual is a direct reaction to the increasingly hostile position of the Republican Party toward … Read more

In a bid to reduce greenwashing the Federal Council has outlined a definition for sustainable investments and set up a working group to examine how this can be implemented. The Swiss body set out its position in a paper last week, stating financial products can only be labelled as sustainable if they align with one … Read more

Finance professionals have welcomed increased clarity on financial flows to protect ecosystems around the world following global leaders’ agreement of the wording of the Kunming-Montreal global biodiversity framework (GBF) at COP15. The framework, which has been under negotiation for four years with talks ramping up in Montreal over the past two weeks, sets out four … Read more

Throughout my childhood, I have always been passionate about investing. This materialized in founding my high school’s investment club and managing the sustainability portfolio at Colorado College, where I am currently studying for a bachelor’s degree in mathematical economics.   While investment clubs often focus solely on earning the highest returns, my experience was much … Read more

Asset managers should not wait for biodiversity data to become as freely available as climate information before acting on nature-related issues, panelists said during finance day at COP15. While data on biodiversity is far from ubiquitous, there is a growing base of qualitative information and frameworks that can help financial institutions identify nature-related risks in … Read more

Asset manager TrueMark Investments recently added an ETF focused on renewable energy. The TrueShares Eagle Global Renewable Energy Income ETF launched Dec. 8. The actively managed fund seeks to invest in stocks of companies involved in renewable energy, including solar, wind, biofuels, hydropower, nuclear or geothermal power, according to the prospectus. The subadvisor, Eagle Global … Read more

In the good old days, the name of a mutual fund gave investors a clear hint about the investment objective and/or strategy of the fund. Unfortunately, these days are over, and fund names have become another tool in the toolbox for product marketing. This means that product managers are seeking fund names which are catching … Read more

The much-delayed UN biodiversity summit COP15 is finally underway in Montreal, where governments are expected to agree on a new Global Biodiversity Framework. Our societies and economies are already facing the ravages of environmental breakdown – and this could be a moment to change our planet’s future. Human activities are driving a rate of species … Read more

Calls for the UK government to clarify its net-zero strategy intensified yesterday as it emerged the government will not fulfil its legal obligation to put the climate element of its green taxonomy into law by the end of 2022. A statement made on 14 December by Baroness Penn, Treasury lords minister, said the government will … Read more

The International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) has told COP15 delegates it will be defining sustainability as “inextricably” linked to nature in its disclosure standards. Speaking on Finance Day yesterday at the conference in Montreal, Emmanuel Faber (pictured), ISSB chair, said the board wanted to clarify the definition and move away from the “alphabet soup” of … Read more