Banks Claim They’re Still in the Climate Fight. Are They?
Having fled a major climate alliance, some worry Wall Street giants may lose their stomach for financing a low-carbon transition.
Larry Fink is chief executive of BlackRock Inc., which said its departure last week from the Net Zero Asset Managers initiative “doesn’t change the way we develop products and solutions for clients or how we manage their portfolios.”
Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg
The exodus of Wall Street’s biggest firms from prominent climate groups has been greeted with triumphant cheers from Republicans in the US who accuse such coalitions of colluding to boycott the fossil-fuel industry. It could prove to be a hollow victory, though.
That’s because, almost without fail, every lender that’s recently left the Net-Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA), including JPMorgan Chase & Co., Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc. and Morgan Stanley, has taken great pains to claim that quitting the group wasn’t the same as quitting their net-zero goals (or helping their clients achieve their targets). BlackRock Inc. for example said its departure last week from the Net Zero Asset Managers initiative “doesn’t change the way we develop products and solutions for clients or how we manage their portfolios.”