Banks
NAB
Bank AGM Season 2024
The 2024 Australian bank AGM season is done and dusted, with one key takeaway: Big portions of the banks’ shareholders, including many of Australia’s top super funds, want to see the banks live up to their climate commitments and stop financing companies that plan to grow their fossil fuel production.
An average of more than a quarter of ANZ, NAB and Westpac shareholder votes went in favour of Market Forces’ resolutions calling on the banks to exclude finance to fossil fuel companies that don’t have Paris-aligned transition plans. This is hugely significant given the boards of all the banks recommended against these resolutions and 95% of shareholder votes typically go in line with board recommendations.
2025 is a big year for Australia’s big four banks. ANZ, NAB and Westpac have all set policies which require their major fossil fuel clients to have climate transition plans in place by October this year. Theoretically, that means if a fossil fuel company cannot demonstrate on paper that it has a plan to scale down its emissions in line with the goals of the Paris Agreement they could be ineligible to receive financial support from Australia’s largest lenders.
But these policies still contain plenty of loopholes that could see the big four continue to pour money into climate wrecking companies even beyond the October ‘deadline’.
We’re putting pressure on the banks to fix these loopholes to ensure they don’t give another cent to the world’s climate wreckers, and we need your help!
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Tell ANZ, NAB and Westpac to close their fossil fuel finance gaps and end their support for climate wreckers once and for all!
NAB indicates it will stop financing companies expanding fossil fuels this year
2024 AGM result: 14.8% in favour
- NAB held its 2024 AGM in Melbourne on the 18th of December.
- At its 2023 AGM, a massive 28.3% of shareholder votes were cast in favour of a Market Forces resolution calling for the bank to stop financing fossil fuel companies without Paris-aligned transition plans.
- At its 2024 AGM in Melbourne, NAB Chair Philip Chronican indicated that the bank will stop providing finance to fossil fuel extraction companies with expansion plans this year.
- The board also faced questions from frontline communities, including farmers whose businesses are existentially threatened by climate disasters.
NAB was put on notice at its 2023 AGM. Investors accounting for 28.3% of NAB’s shares defied the board’s recommendations and voted in favour of a Market Forces resolution calling for the bank to stop financing fossil fuel companies without Paris-aligned transition plans.
NAB appeared to get the message and set about making changes in 2024. In November, NAB effectively closed the door on directly financing fossil fuel expansion projects with a sweeping series of new policy exclusions.
While this was a welcome, if not overdue development, there were still big question marks over NAB’s provision of corporate finance and bonds to fossil fuel companies. Almost 70% of NAB’s fossil fuel lending between 2016-2023 was in the form of ‘corporate finance’, meaning it was not related to any specific fossil fuel project, but as general finance for a company. This loophole enabled NAB to loan $5.4 billion to companies with plans to expand coal, oil and gas from 2016-2023, with $859 million to such companies in 2023 alone.
NAB puts fossil fuel companies on notice – expansion plans mean no more finance
NAB also signalled a possible end to its financial support for companies expanding fossil fuels by disclosing that it will refuse finance to companies with a ‘limited’ transition plan after October 2025. But with scant detail about how ‘limited’ is defined, shareholders still had no clear answer about whether NAB’s policy would allow it to keep pouring money into climate wrecking clients like Santos.
When asked about this at its AGM in December, NAB Chair Philip Chronican gave a surprisingly encouraging answer. Market Forces Bank Analyst, Kyle Robertson, asked Mr. Chronican whether NAB would consider a fossil fuel company with expansion plans to have a ‘limited’ transition plan.
Mr. Chronican said that under NAB’s current framework, a company expanding fossil fuels would fail to meet the bank’s current requirements and would be ineligible for finance.
It’s a fairly astonishing admission which means that beyond October 2025, oil and gas producing and coal mining companies with expansion plans will be ineligible for finance from two of Australia’s biggest banks – NAB and Commonwealth Bank.
While it appears that NAB is finally aligning its position with the world’s climate scientists, it now must commit to this position in its policy framework.
NAB board faces questions from frontline communities bearing the impacts of climate disasters
NAB is Australia’s leading agribusiness bank, proudly claiming to support over 1 in 3 of Australia’s 85,000 farming businesses.
Yet Australian farmers are facing the impacts of climate change on their businesses everyday, fuelled by the reckless expansion plans of NAB’s clients like Glencore, APA Group and Santos.
Annual profits for Australian farms have reduced by 23% over the last two decades due to climate change. By 2050, extreme events related to climate change are projected to halve the agricultural output of the irrigated areas of the Murray–Darling Basin.
Insurance for farming businesses has skyrocketed due to extreme weather events, with many claiming the insurance costs are simply becoming unaffordable. Some farmers’ insurance bills have more than doubled in just a few years.
Peter Lake, a grazier from the New South Wales northern rivers region and NAB customer, has seen the impacts of climate change on his farm firsthand. Mr. Lake spoke passionately about the impact of successive flooding events on his business, including the devastating 2022 floods on Australia’s east coast.
Peter is also a member of Farmers for Climate Action, a group representing more than 8,000 farmers across Australia committed to taking real climate action.
Mr. Lake implored the NAB board to stop supporting its fossil fuel customers’ expansion plans which are driving climate disasters and hurting farming businesses across the country. Watch the exchange below.
NAB was also questioned over its support for Santos and APA Group, two of Australia’s biggest gas companies with interests in Australia’s biggest proposed gas development, the Beetaloo sub-Basin.
Over its lifetime, Market Forces estimates Beetaloo will produce 1.1 billion tonnes CO2-e, equivalent to Australia’s largest coal plant, Eraring, operating for more than 83 years.
Jo Dodds, President and co-founder of Bushfire Survivors for Climate Action, attended the NAB AGM to ask the NAB board how it justifies supporting companies pursuing projects like Beetaloo which will fuel catastrophic bushfire events like the Black Summer bushfires that she and her community had to live through.
Ms. Dodds delivered a powerful, yet sombering recounting of her firsthand experience with the Black Summer bushfires to the board, met with applause from shareholders in the room. It was a powerful reminder to the decision-makers at one of Australia’s biggest banks about what is at stake for Australian communities as the climate crisis worsens, and of the absolute imperative to act urgently and to reduce emissions before it’s too late.
Watch the exchange below.
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