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ESG issues in the asset management area

ESG issues in the asset management area

Day 1 Afternoon

Wednesday 26 April

Room :

ROOM 2

Speakers

Chair
Christina Papaconstantinou
Deputy Governor - Bank of Greece
Public Authorities
Thorsten Pötzsch
Chief Executive Director of Securities Supervision - Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, Germany (BaFin)
Marco Zwick
Director - Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (CSSF)
Industry Representatives
Laurence Caron-Habib
Head of Public Affairs - BNP Paribas Asset Management
Gemma Corrigan
Head of Policy and ESG Integration - Federated Hermes (UK) LLP
David Henry Doyle
Vice President, Head of Government Affairs & Public Policy EMEA - S&P Global
Other stakeholder & expert
Julia Symon
Head of Research and Advocacy - Finance Watch

Objectives

The development of market tools like labels and ESG ratings and also of a specific EU regulation on ESG transparency should help to ensure ESG transparency in the asset-management sector. But ESG labels and ESG rating agencies have been criticised for not being green enough and/or for not being transparent enough. The implementation of SFDR since March 2021 has not up to now brought enough clarity, as shown by the confusion about the so-called “Article 9 funds”, supposed to be clearly sustainable and which have flourished in 2022 but which triggered controversies and finally were reclassified in “Article 8 funds”, supposed to be moderately sustainable.
The roundtable will assess the role and efficiency of these market tools and of the EU regulation and will look at the ways to overcome the current difficulties.

Points of discussion

  1. Do you think that labels and ESG ratings ensure an effective ESG assessment of corporates (issuers) and of financial investment products?
  2. How do you assess the implementation of SFDR in 2022?
  3. How labels, ESG ratings and implementation of SFDR could be improved to ensure a better ESG transparency in the asset-management sector?