Confluence Adds MSCI ESG Research Data into Style Analytics

Confluence Technologies, a solutions provider to the investment management industry, has integrated MSCI ESG Research data into its factor investing analytics solution, Style Analytics. The data will help asset managers and fund selectors by offering in-depth analysis, comparison, and enhancement of portfolios.

Damian Handzy, managing director, analytics, at Confluence, comments: “Style Analytics’ integration of MSCI’s ESG data marks a significant step to help our clients make informed investment decisions and achieve sustainable growth.”

The integration supports drill-down capabilities, fund-of-funds capabilities for United Nations SDGs and analytics, as well as factor analysis using an intuitive user interface. Users can gain actionable data, identify optimal investment opportunities and monitor performance over time.

Bloomberg ESG Data Supports Hong Kong Greenhouse Gas Emissions Elimination Tool

Bloomberg ESG data is supporting development of the recently released greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions estimation tool of Hong Kong’s Green and Sustainable Finance Cross-Agency Steering Group (Steering Group) and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST). The tool is part of key initiatives to facilitate sustainability reporting by corporates and financial institutions in Hong Kong led by the Steering Group, which is co-chaired by the Securities & Futures Commission of Hong Kong and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority.

The tool deploys a regression model using data from listed companies and small- and medium-sized enterprises to represent corporate energy consumption and associated Scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions and enables financial institutions to estimate the GHG emissions of their investees or borrowers in their portfolios, which is important where data from underlying companies is limited. The energy consumption data and GHG emissions data of Hong Kong listed companies used for the model is procured from Bloomberg.

SEC Approves Watered-Down Climate Reporting Rules

American listed companies will not have to report on their Scope 3 emissions in rules that will, however, require them for the first time to disclose other climate data.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) yesterday approved measures that would bind corporates into presenting data on the climate risks they face, their plans to mitigate them and, for some, their own greenhouse gas emissions. The aim of the rules is to present investors with consistent and comparable data on which to make portfolio and risk management decisions, the SEC said.

“Our federal securities laws lay out a basic bargain. Investors get to decide which risks they want to take so long as companies raising money from the public make what President Franklin Roosevelt called ‘complete and truthful disclosure’,” SEC chair Gary Gensler said. “These final rules build on past requirements by mandating material climate risk disclosures by public companies and in public offerings.”

The Federal rules are the first of their kind in the US but fall well short of requirements under the European Union’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD). While they have been long in the making, SEC commissioners eventually presented a far more diluted set of measures than had been initially proposed in March 2022, including the declaration of emissions from supply and distribution chains.

Divided Reception

The SEC also watered down reporting requirements on Scope 1 and 2 emissions, those caused directly by companies’ own operations and energy usage. Firms will only be expected to make such disclosures if they are not already obliged to do so in other jurisdictions.

The announcement received a divided reception. Sustainable markets campaigner Ceres said the rules “represent a major victory for transparency in capital markets” but said it “will continue to advocate for voluntary and mandatory disclosures of a company’s full scope of emissions”.

The watering down of the initial proposals comes amid a growing anti-ESG movement in US. Since Gensler first proposed a climate reporting bill, opponents have rallied to demonise the ESG project. Banks and institutions have also lobbied against tough measures.

Many US state leaders have instigated bans on public funds being invested in sustainable markets and conservative movements have put pressure on institutions to row back on their ESG strategies.

Despite the SEC’s lowering of disclosure obligations, a coalition of states has already said it will oppose the measures. The SEC has said in response it will “vigorously defend the disclosures” in court.

Nature-linked Indexes Added to S&P Sustainability Benchmarks

S&P Dow Jones Indices has added another set of ESG-themed benchmarks to its roster, this time providing a gauge for nature-focused investors.

The S&P 500 Biodiversity Index and the S&P Global LargeMidCap Biodiversity Index are intended to provide broad views of the impacts companies are having on nature and vice versa.

The new suite follows the creation of a set of indexes that track corporate alignment with United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). The nature-linked indexes are calibrated to the COP15 Montreal biodiversity protection targets and built on S&P’s nature, biodiversity and carbon datasets as well as its SDG metrics.

“Research shows that 85 per cent of the world’s largest companies have a significant dependency on nature and biodiversity. This makes access to nature- and biodiversity-focused data, insights, and analytics essential in the support of market participants understanding, managing, and mitigating exposure of nature-related risks and impacts,” said Steven Bullock, global head of research and methodology at S&P Global Sustainable1, S&P’s ESG business unit.

Investors See Relevance in Double Materiality Ratings: ISS ESG Survey

Institutional investors believe that ESG ratings built on a double materiality methodology are “very relevant” to them, according to an ISS ESG survey of client needs.

The analysis also found that investors consider the reporting standards of International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB), UN Global Compact (UNGC) and the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) most relevant to their needs.

The findings were contained in the company’s ESG Corporate Rating Survey, in which it sought to gauge client responses to the methodologies it uses to create its sustainability research.

The survey results, which will be discussed in a webinar next month, also show that investors’ most relevant ESG theme is addressing climate change.

SIX Adds to ESG Products With SME Assessment Tool

Swiss financial giant SIX has launched a tool that will enable banking clients to make assessments on the sustainability performance of small- and medium-sized enterprises on their loan books.

The service is backed by Greenomy, an ESG assessment and reporting company that the Swiss company acquired late last year. With Greenomy’s software-as-a-service platform, the solution will help banks comply with regulations such as the EU’s new Banking Book Taxonomy Alignment Ratio (EU BTAR).

Further, banking clients will be able to gauge their debtors’ sustainability risk trajectories.

“The importance of gaining a clearer insight into the climate credentials of small and medium-sized enterprises cannot be overstated,” said SIX head of financial information Marion Leslie. “After all, SMEs represent 90 per cent of businesses worldwide, not to mention 99 per cent of the EU’s economy.”

The SME Sustainability Assessment Solution is the latest tool to be released by SIX this year. The Zurich-based operator of the stock exchanges of Switzerland and Spain unveiled a climate-specific data tool last month. That was the first in a programme of product releases that SIX head of ESG product strategy Martina McPherson said would create a one-stop-shop of sustainability data services.

EU Approves Proposal to Regulate ESG Ratings Providers

European Union leaders have agreed on a proposal to regulate ESG ratings providers, requiring them to be registered and monitored by financial authorities.
Under the planned framework jointly backed by the EU’s executive, the European Council, and its parliament, ESG ratings providers must abide by transparency rules that will oblige them to publish the data and methodologies behind their calculations.

The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) will keep check of the companies.

The regulation is hoped to bring harmony to the fragmented ESG ratings sector, which has been frequently blamed for paving the way for greenwashing. The EU also expects that eventually there will be providers of separate E, S and G ratings.

When the proposal is passed, the EU is be the first major financial authority to bring ESG ratings firms within the orbit of regulators, a move that is also being considered in the UK and US.

UK ESG Ratings Code of Conduct to be Explained in London

LSEG, the owner of the London Stock Exchange, will host an event to discuss how the UK’s code of conduct covering ESG ratings and data companies will work in practice.

Companies are being invited to sign up to the code of conduct after it was launched in December following its proposal in the summer. The January 31 event in London is aimed at explaining to signatories and other stakeholders how they will be affected by the measure.

The code envisages a six-principles approach to bringing order to ESG ratings whose providers face criticism over inconsistencies in their scores and conflicts of interest.

It was commissioned by the UK regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), which created the ESG Data and Ratings Code of Conduct Working Group (DRWG) to draw up the proposals. The working group was supported by the International Regulatory Strategy Group (IRSG) and the International Capital Market Association (ICMA).

S&P DJI Launches Impact-Focused SDG-Alignment Benchmarks

Two new sustainability indices have been launched by S&P Dow Jones Indices (S&P DJI) enabling investors to benchmark against companies aligned with the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The S&P 500 SDG Index and the S&P Global LargeMidCap SDG Index are built on data that reflect the constituent companies’ impact on the environment and society. They don’t take into account the financial materiality of ESG factors.

“With this approach, S&P DJI is offering broad-based sustainability performance measurement tools, one that is based on the S&P 500, which is the best single gauge of large-cap US equities, and the other based on the S&P Global Large MidCap Index, which represents the top 85% market capitalisation of each developed and emerging country,” said Jas Duhra, Global Head of Sustainability Indices at S&P DJI.

The indices’ data is sourced from London-based impact data provider Impact Cubed.

Europe’s Insurance and Pensions Firms Back EU Ratings Regulation

European plans to regulate ESG ratings providers has won backing from the region’s pension and insurance industries.

PensionsEurope and Insurance Europe, which represent companies across the bloc, said the European Commission’s (EC) proposed Rating Regulation would “lead to a significant enhancement in the transparency of ESG ratings”.

The EC wants to bring ratings providers under the wings of its regulator to help prevent greenwashing and to ensure greater visibility in the calculations that go into each provider’s rating. Critics describe the firms’ methodologies as “black boxes” for the lack of transparency into how they are determined.

“There is an urgent need for the availability and transparency of ESG data to be improved, not only to fulfil regulatory requirements but, more importantly, to reallocate capital to sustainable assets,” the two organisations wrote in a joint statement.