The DIRTY Profits 7 report presented today in Frankfurt am Main by the NGO Facing Finance highlights the ten European banks with some of the highest investments in 11 global arms companies, companies that have since 2015 been exporting to unstable/crisis-affected countries in the MENA region (Middle East and North Africa) and countries involved in the war in Yemen. The results: Ten European banks have provided roughly €24.2 billion in finance, and hold some €10 billion in investments in 11 arms companies exporting to Saudi Arabia, the…

Eight financial institutions have handed Europe’s most polluting utilities almost €16 billion in support since the Paris Agreement was signed in December 2015, a new briefing by Europe Beyond Coal and its partners BankTrack, Foundation Development YES – Open-Pit Mines NO, Friends of the Earth France, IIDMA, Re:Common and urgewald has found.   Fool’s Gold – the Financial Institutions Bankrolling Europe’s Most Coal-dependent Utilities ranks European financial institutions for their exposure to…

Green Bonds are used to finance business-as-usual tree plantations and operations of the paper & pulp industry and claiming exaggerated CO2 savings, a new briefing by the Environmental Paper Network (EPN) shows. The briefing presents a case study of a Green Bond issued by the Brazilian pulp & paper giant Fibria, even though the company has not engaged in any kind of environmental reorientation of its business activities. Instead, its Green Bond was used to finance expansions of monoculture industrial tree plantations. The briefing argues…

The Environmental Paper Network, Global Forest Coalition and Biofuelwatch have today issued a Briefing to investors that highlights the serious reputational, regulatory, legal, and financial risks associated with bioenergy projects that rely on wood from forests and tree plantations. The briefing highlights that installations that burn forest biomass are almost always dependent on public subsidies and thus highly vulnerable to policy change. In several cases, larger projects have failed to return a profit even…

Today BankTrack is pleased to present its 2018 Annual Report, detailing our work to stop banks from financing harmful business activities, promote a banking sector that respects human rights and contributes to just societies and a healthy planet, and to support others in civil society who share these aims. For BankTrack, 2018 was first and foremost the year to drastically up our game on climate change. Together with allies around the world we launched our new flagship ‘Fossil Banks, No Thanks!’ campaign. Recognising we can no longer…