Compliance Issues in Green Investing and Sustainable Finance

• We are well aware of how FCA expectations and good practices have changed.
• We have served clients of all shapes and sizes in the financial sector and are fully aware of the obligations of a regulated firm and what is expected from them by the regulator.
• We have been delivering training for over 20 years. We are certain we know the topic as well as anyone in the marketplace
• Your course director is experienced as both a regulator and in training regulatory compliance requirements across wholesale and retail financial firms. He will pass on past experiences to enhance the workshop and help bring it to life
• We do not use academics. All our trainers are highly experienced professionals with relevant vocational experience in the real world
• Our case studies enhance the learning points and are often found to be essential in truly understanding the requirements and growing the skills to apply them
• We are always judged by our results, which speak for themselves and the feedback received from previous delegates has always been excellent.

• Recognise external drivers influencing our approach to sustainable finance compliance
• To understand the impact on governance and strategy
• How we can organise ourselves effectively to meet the needs of all our stakeholders
• Consider the underlying impacts of our investment and business decisions
• Recognise upstream and downstream environmental impacts of our business and reconcile that with our stated values
• Revisit our risk framework through a green lens
• Reconsider how we measure and stretch our businesses
• Understand the evolving mandatory disclosure regime

Session 1: Introduction – the regulatory position

• FCA Workstreams
• The Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR)
• Sustainable Finance Taskforce – IOSCO (International Organization of Securities Commissions)
• Building back better
• Government commitment to net zero 2050
• Green Finance Taskforce - Government and private sector in collaboration

Session 2: Governance & Strategy

• Describe the organization’s governance around climate-related risks and opportunities.
• Describe management’s role in assessing and managing climate-related risks and opportunities.
• Declare and halt your negative impact
• Identify and assess the climate-related risks and opportunities you have identified over the short, medium, and long term.
• Embedding an understanding of the impact of climate-related risks and opportunities on the organisation’s operations, strategy, and financial planning.
• Evolving client priorities
• All-stakeholder consideration / involvement
• Strategy resiliency: the resilience of the organisation’s strategy, taking into consideration different climate-related scenarios
• Engagement Risk (Preparing for the Minsky Moment)
• Scenario analysis in finance 

Session 3: Investment Universe

• Promoting good disclosures along the investment chain.
• Investor stewardship
• Ensuring that the market delivers sustainable finance instruments and products that genuinely meet investors’ sustainability preferences. Seize new opportunities.
• Richard Monks – “five guiding principles”
• “FCA tells asset managers to challenge companies on climate” (Shareholder Impact)
• Greenwashing – standards to defend your position
• “Light green” products
• Transition risk - stranded assets

Session 4: Risk Management

• Understanding and minimising your risks – including physical risks and associated impacts
• De-centralising the organization’s processes for identifying and assessing climate-related risks.
• Standardising the organization’s processes for managing climate-related risks.
• How do processes for identifying, assessing, and managing climate-related risks integrated into the organization’s overall risk management
• Internal risks (procurement, property, plant)
• 3rd party risks (vendors, outsourced providers, associated persons, manufacturers/distributors) 

Session 5: Metrics and Targets

• Designing and embedding the metrics used by the organization to assess climate-related risks and opportunities in line with its strategy and risk management process.
• Identify and control Scope 1, Scope 2 and, if appropriate, Scope 3 greenhouse gas (Greenhouse Gas Protocol) emissions and the related risks.
• Data integrity in an evolving environment
• Maintaining the targets used by the organization to manage climate-related risks and opportunities
• Reporting on performance against targets internally and externally.

• Climate-related disclosures – Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosure standards
• TCFD-aligned Mandatory disclosure regime
• 7 principles for effective disclosure
• UK listed commercial companies with a premium listing
• FCA disclosure regime for ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) matters
• International reporting standards

Course Wrap-up:

• Summary
• Questions
• Open forum

The trainer has over 20 years’ experience in compliance and risk management leading European and Global functions in Wealth Management divisions, custodians and global banks.  An ex-regulator, he specialises in regulatory and financial crime compliance and has provided consultancy to retail, private and commercial banking operations as well as fund managers and investment houses.

“The greatest commercial opportunity of all time.”

Mark Carney, former Governor of the Bank of England and UN Special Envoy: Climate Action and Finance

Within our industry, we have to choose between being a force for good or a force for greed.  While firms will want to provide products and services their clients want, as well as a better world to live in along the way, there is a risk.  Some firms will inadvertently misrepresent the green credentials of their products to clients (and some may do so deliberately).  Some firms will find the impact of their own commitments being curtailed by the behaviours of third parties working with them, or by different functions within the organisation progressing their sustainability programme in different ways or at a different pace. Green and sustainable finance will undoubtedly be of significant importance to consumers and regulators.

Governments and Regulators want financial services firms to play their role in this new world while at the same time being wary of emerging threats to consumer protection, market integrity or competition in the marketplace.  Rules and regulations seek to control this risk and set expectations of conduct.  The compliance function needs to be able to advise and assist the firm on what the rules require, and to monitor and assess what their colleagues have put in place.

This Compliance Issues in Green Investing and Sustainable Finance course looks at these emerging requirements from a Compliance perspective.  How do we evidence knowledge and competence?  What type of governance do we have and how do we know its effective?  How do we understand external risks that impact us, our reporting, our reputation and our own compliance?