BlackRock, Citi CEOs won't be returning to key climate talks

The biggest climate event of the calendar looks set to draw far fewer chief executives than it did just a year ago.

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink won't be at the COP27 summit in Egypt next month and will instead attend a meeting of the firm's board of directors, according to people familiar with his plans. Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser will also stay away, as will Bill Winters of Standard Chartered, spokespeople for the banks said. All three made a point of attending in 2021.

Stefan Wermuth/Bloomberg

They lead a long list of top-level executives giving this year's summit a lower priority, according to responses gathered by Bloomberg News based on current plans.

BlackRock and others will instead be sending delegations consisting of lower-tier representatives, according to spokespeople for the firms. Standard Chartered will send its chief sustainability officer, Marisa Drew.

BlackRock, which has yet to settle on who will be going, said it "looks forward to having a meaningful, senior presence at COP27 to engage with key stakeholders on one of the biggest themes for our clients," in an emailed statement.

Fink was the star appearance last year as the heavyweights of big finance made their way to COP26 in Scotland to declare their commitment to slashing emissions. Former Bank of England Governor Mark Carney had predicted that sustainable finance would make the leap "to the C-suite" and, as if to prove him right, Fink made a big impression at COP26, donning a polka-dot tie and brown hiking boots as he discussed the dangers of greenwashing.

A key milestone of last year's COP was commitments secured by the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero, to which BlackRock, Citi and roughly 500 other financial firms are signatories. With more than $135 trillion in assets, GFANZ was supposed to be the planet's ticket to a more climate-friendly form of finance. But a year later, it's unclear how members will live up to their promises. (GFANZ is co-chaired by Carney and Michael R. Bloomberg, the founder of Bloomberg News parent Bloomberg LP.)

Instead, attention has shifted to navigating the fallout from war, energy shortages, inflation and the threat of recession. Efforts to fight greenhouse gas emissions, meanwhile, appear to be faltering.

Scientists estimate that the world is on track to warm by 2.7C, based on current policies. That's close to double the critical 1.5C threshold beyond which climate catastrophe looms.

BloombergNEF estimates that COP27 only has a 43% chance of success. Billed as the "implementation of COP," it "won't command the same fanfare" as last year's event, BloombergNEF's Victoria Cuming said on Wednesday.

Estimated probability of achievement for nine metrics of a meaningful COP27 This year's COP also takes place against a very different political backdrop. More than a dozen Republican-led states in the US have sought to ostracize banks and asset managers deemed hostile toward the fossil-fuel industry.

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BlackRock, in particular, has been singled out as a target of GOP ire, with Fink's previous comments on climate risk providing fodder for attacks. That's led the world's largest asset manager to embark on a PR campaign to try to dispel any notion it's withholding support for oil and gas.

In a recent statement, BlackRock said "we do not boycott the energy industry" and pointed to $170 billion in investments in U.S. public energy companies as proof.

Meanwhile, climate activists have criticized the net-zero alliances under GFANZ for making little progress in addressing their financed emissions. In a study published this month, environmental think tank Universal Owner called the net-zero target-setting process of the asset managers' alliance "irrevocably flawed."

And the bankers alliance has faced potential defections, after some of its biggest members pushed back against a plan to impose binding restrictions on fossil finance.

In an interview earlier this year, Carney warned against taking too critical a stance toward the finance industry. The first step was to secure commitments, he said. The next step is "plumbing work," whereby the goal is to "operationalize those commitments into net-zero plans and transition plans."

Last year's COP summit marked a deadline under the rules of the 2015 Paris Agreement to commit to new carbon emissions reduction targets. Among its main achievements was the finalization of the so-called Paris Agreement rulebook, which lays out how countries making climate pledges can be held accountable.

This year, the goal is to "operationalize and implement the Paris Agreement," analysts at HSBC Holdings wrote to clients in a recent note.

"There are fewer critical decisions to be made," they wrote. But COP27 "will still be vital in progressing climate discussions."

So turnout "will signal how governments, businesses and the general public are pursuing continued climate action over the short term," they wrote.

— With assistance from Sylvia Klimaki, Eric Roston and Harry Wilson.