DITCHED: A Dire Warning for Financial Markets

Sep 22, 2020

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“Climate change poses a major risk to the stability of the U.S. financial system and to its ability to sustain the American economy.” That’s the top line takeaway from a landmark new report from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

While the core finding isn’t entirely new, the CFTC report carries weight. “Managing Climate Risk in the U.S. Financial System,” commissioned by a panel of President Trump appointed federal regulators, is the first comprehensive federal government study to focus on the risks climate change presents to Wall Street.

Divya Mankikar is an investment manager at the California Public Employees' Retirement System, or CalPERS, where she works to shed light on integrating environmental, social and governance factors across the roughly 400 billion fund — the largest public pension fund in the U.S. She’s also a member of the subcommittee that authored the recently released CFTC climate risk report.

In this episode, Divya outlines the report’s main findings and details how CalPERS and other large investors are acting on a growing body of climate risk information.

This is the fifth episode in the Political Climate miniseries called DITCHED: fossil fuels, money flows and the greening of finance. Listen and subscribe to Political Climate wherever you get podcasts!