How European banks helped fossil fuel companies with bond markets

European banks supported fossil fuel companies raise around €1tn from international bond markets; a pan-European analysis looked at thousands of transactions since the Paris Climate Accord 2016.

Banks, including a few of European banks, have supported fossil fuel firms to raise around €1tn (£869bn) from the international bond markets since the Paris Climate Accord, according to an analysis by the press and its reporting partners.

In the push to zero carbon, Europe’s largest lenders face increasing pressure to restrict their financial help for fossil fuel firms through direct loans and other financing facilities.

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But an investigation of thousands of transactions since 2016, when more than 190 nations agreed at a UN conference in Paris to restrict global warming by depriving pollution, has disclosed that lenders including Deutsche Bank, HSBC, and Barclays have continued to profit from the expansion of oil, gas, and coal by keeping the sale of fossil fuel bonds.

The results have raised concerns among sustainable investment campaigners that banks resume offering “hidden” economic support to energy firms liable for increasing the world’s carbon emissions – even as they vow publicly to phase out direct lending for new projects.