Boosts fossil free funds & calls on investors to move in a more sustainable direction

One Planet Summit - Largest Norwegian asset manager boosts fossil free funds to over US$3 billion & calls on investors to move their money in a more sustainable direction.

Tuesday 12th December, 8am CET (Paris/Oslo). At the ‘One Planet’ Summit in Paris, hosted by President Macron, Storebrand, Norway’s largest asset manager (US$80 billion AuM) is launching a new fossil free bond program, which complements the already existing range of fossil free equity funds. The new bonds fund is launched with initial capital amounting to US$1.3 bn.

In line with the One Planet Summit goals, two years after the historic Paris Agreement was concluded, we are providing new tangible responses that go far beyond reporting, and openly demonstrate that we are undertaking concrete investor action. We aim to inspire others to follow suit.

Storebrand Global Kreditt IG (UCITS) is a fossil free actively managed global bond fund, which invests primarily in international corporate bonds issued by financial institutions and industrial companies within the OECD. The fund excludes investments in the energy sector and thus refrains from investing in companies that have their main business linked to coal, oil and gas extraction industries and other related activities.

Jan Erik Saugestad, CEO of Storebrand Asset Management said:

“The climate crisis is starting to engulf us, foreboded by the California wildfires. Fossil free strategies are a powerful tool, helping us shift billions away from investments without a future, and into attractive investments with a positive climate impact. The rise of these funds responds to the growing public concern over climate change, and this is our contribution to the growing global divestment movement. We recently dumped even more coal industry linked companies because these investments are poor, both from a financial point of view and for the future of our planet.”

“We are now actively challenging the investment plans of the oil and gas industry, and through our fossil free solutions we are also reducing our overall exposure to these oil and gas companies. This approach paves the way for our investment in the renewable energy industry, which is both profitable and sustainable.”

“We cannot allow one unhinged President to distract and derail progressive, concrete actions. In fact, we still view North America as a priority growth market because even since Obama’s Clean Power Plan was ordered to roll back,US$30 billion has been invested in solar and wind projects, whilst the coal industry is walking dead:30 gigawatts of coal power has been retired there over the last three years. We urge other investors and countries to end their complacency and take action now by moving their money, making it fossil free.”

The fund also refrains from investing in companies that have revenue of more than 5 percent from the production and / or distribution of fossil fuels or companies with large fossil reserves. The lowest credit rating at the time of Investment has to be BBB-. The fund's investments are hedged to Norwegian kroner.

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Storebrand is the largest private pension in Norway with over US$80 billion assets under management, second only in size to the trillion dollar Norwegian government pension fund. It has a finance industry-leading coal divestment criteria. The company has wonglobal accolades for sustainability: they are currently ranked second at theCorporate Knights ranking of the 100 most sustainable companies, and first of the financial companies.