Two Greenbank colleagues shortlisted in finals

With the annual Durrell Lecture returning to London’s Royal Institution for the first time since the pandemic, it seemed fitting that the evening’s theme – “Tortoise Tales” – should highlight the trials facing such an extraordinary and vital animal but also celebrate the return of some of the most endangered species to their native habitats.

Greenbank’s stewardship and engagement lead Sophie Lawrence features in this interesting CNBC video with Tim Spector of King’s College London and co-founder of the Zoe personalised nutrition program, Dr Kiara Chang of Imperial College and Rebecca Tobi of The Food Foundation.

UK inflation held at 6.7% in October, remaining the highest rate in the G7. However, while petrol and diesel costs continued to keep the rate high, food and non-alcoholic drinks prices fell for the first time in over two years. The Bank of England held the base rate at 5.25% but remained cautious on the wider economy, downgrading their 2024 growth forecasts.

Greenbank’s head of ethical, sustainable and impact research, Kate Elliot and assistant ESI researcher Katherine Farr hosted our live lunchtime webinar ‘AI, human rights and investment’ on Tuesday 28 November. They were joined by guest speakers Daniel Leufer, senior policy analyst at Access Now, and Zak Rogoff, research manager at Ranking Digital Rights.

Headline UK inflation fell to 6.7% but there were mounting challenges to the UK government's net zero rollback. The Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) published recommendations to help businesses and financial institutions identify and take action to manage nature-related dependencies, impacts, risks and opportunities.

Greenbank’s stewardship and engagement lead, Sophie Lawrence is speaking on the topic of health at two party conference events this year organised by Nesta, the UK’s innovation agency for social good. Nesta has a programme called A Healthy Life with a mission for more people to live a healthier life for longer.

In this issue of the Greenbank Review, we report on our Investor Day held in June. The discussion focused on the theme of technological solutions that will help drive the transition towards net zero.

Greenbank were proud to win the award for ‘Best Sustainable Investment Wealth Manager/ DFM (Discretionary Fund Manager) Group’ at the Investment Week Sustainable Investment Awards 2023.

Joe Crehan, Investment Manager at Greenbank, hosted a live lunchtime webinar on Thursday 12 October. He was joined by two experts, Morag Watson, Scottish Renewables' Director of Policy, and David Farquhar, CEO at Intelligent Growth Solutions (IGS) to discuss the topic of food and energy security on a warming planet.

Increased market volatility in August saw the majority of major indices ending the month in negative territory despite a minor rally in equities, and a report published this month showed that more science-based emissions targets were set in 2022 than in the previous seven years combined.

In our market commentary for this month – the world’s hottest in “hundreds, if not thousands of years” – there’s some good news in the shape of the EU finally agreeing to pass a nature restoration law, delays to licences for industrial-scale deep-sea mineral extraction, and the president of the upcoming COP28 in the UAE looking to finalise a fund for climate-related loss and damage, agreed at COP27 last year.