Anne van Riel, Co-Head of Sustainable Finance Capital Markets, BNP Paribas speaks at Insider's Financing Net Zero event on May 13, 2021Sustainable investing has grown exponentially over the past few years, along with the financial instruments to fund them.
At the same time, with so much at stake, companies are expected to demonstrate a genuine commitment to outcomes, and new and potential regulations are adding to the pressure for transparency. "There is a wide range of different types of instruments now available to us as investors," said Wu, from JPMorgan Asset Management, describing the rise in"sustainability linked bonds." That's a format used when there isn't a dedicated use for the proceeds, but the company commits to targets toward green goals within a specific time frame.Many companies are already incentivized to go green, according to IDA Ireland's Donoghue.
For those companies, transition bonds will finance projects that are intended to fund steps towards a more sustainable future, with regulatory guardrails in place to ensure they are legitimately on that path. While the climate crisis, central to the"E" parts of ESG, is currently the top priority in the sustainability spectrum, the panel also acknowledged the importance of the social and governance targets in driving innovation and change.