Westpac, NAB and ANZ called upon to reduce exposure to fossil fuels in line with the Paris Agreement’s climate change goals. Thursday 10 October 2019 Environmental finance organisation Market Forces is today lodging shareholder resolutions with Westpac, NAB and ANZ today. The resolutions call for a reduction in lending and … Read More
Suncorp and QBE abandon coal but are still undermining Paris Agreement
1 August 2019 The insurance sector globally is waking up to the fact that if it wants to avoid the growing impact on its profits caused by the climate crisis, it needs to stop providing insurance to and investing in the companies that are fuelling it. At least 16 major … Read More
Market Forces’ take on BHP’s latest climate commitments
31 July 2019 Last week, BHP Billiton CEO Andrew Mackenzie made a speech in London that grabbed global headlines for two main reasons: The language he used made it clear that, even if BHP has a long way to go on addressing climate risk, there’s no doubt that the company … Read More
Media release: Suncorp dumps thermal coal
26 July 2019 In response to Market Forces lodging a shareholder resolution, Suncorp has revealed it is exiting the thermal coal sector, meaning there are now no Australian insurers willing to underwrite new thermal coal mines and power stations. A Suncorp spokesman told InsuranceNews, “Suncorp does not directly invest in, … Read More
Norwegian sovereign wealth fund pulls $3 billion out of AGL, BHP and South32
The Norwegian government’s decision to tighten the Government Pension Fund Global’s (GPFG) coal exclusion criteria will see the world’s richest sovereign wealth fund withdraw a combined AU$3 billion from AGL, BHP and South32. The announcement comes at a particularly bad time for AGL, just days after the company’s share price … Read More
QBE’s unanswered questions
11 June 2019 It’s not often that an annual general meeting (AGM) can be described as compelling. QBE’s AGM held on 9 May, however, delivered the goods with several questions from the floor resulting in extraordinary exchanges between shareholders and the chairman Marty Becker and CEO Pat Regan. Unfortunately, these … Read More
Woodside CEO admits gas the loser if the world limits warming to 1.5 degrees
In a week where climate change dominated global headlines with the UK Parliament’s declaration of a climate emergency and school strikers taking to the streets in over 500 locations worldwide, corporate Australia was also facing increasing scrutiny on climate change. Woodside’s annual general meeting on Thursday 2 May 2019 in … Read More
Nothing explosive about Orica’s climate disclosures
Orica provide explosives, blasting and tunnelling services to the mining, oil and gas, and construction industries. Unlike some of its industry peers, Orica’s published reports do give shareholders some sense of reality: the company accepts the science of climate change, recognises the need for scenario analysis, and this year began … Read More
Karoon Gas: not quite the environmentalist it claims to be
30 November 2018 “We are at heart environmentalists,” CEO Robert Hosking of oil explorer and soon-to-be producer, Karoon Gas told shareholders at today’s annual general meeting in Melbourne. The company, which is about to drill an offshore oil well in Peru that has a CO2 emissions potential of 110 million tonnes … Read More
Senex passes the buck on climate change targets
15 November 2018 When it comes to measuring the financial risk of climate change, not much has changed for oil and gas company Senex over the past three years. In 2016 its auditors declared they did not consider climate risk as a financial risk. In 2017 the board still hadn’t … Read More
