ESG Disclosure Standards webinar gathered lots of professionals to hear the latest on ESG reporting

Clockwise from left: Annika Esono-Manninen, Chris Fidler, Niina Arkko and Antti Malava.

CFA Society Finland had the pleasure to welcome excellent speakers to our webinar 14th February on the CFA Institute Global ESG Disclosure Standards for Investment Products. We are happy that ESG themed webinars attract a good number of people from our membership and stakeholders. Our board vice president Niina Arkko CFA, hosted the webinar.

Chris Fidler gave an overview on the Standards and how they can help diminish the “communication gap” between investors and asset managers by offering a standardized framework to report on ESG factors in an open and reliable way. They are applicable universally to all investment products, and can be applied on a product-by-product basis. For investors the Standards offer a better way to understand, evaluate, and compare the used ESG approaches. Asset managers are able to offer a comprehensive report on the way their investment products take ESG issues into account, build brand and reduce legal and compliance risks. The Standards include also sample ESG statements.

After the presentation followed a conversation between Chris, Annika Esono-Manninen, Head of ESG, OP Asset Management and Antti Malava, Head of Sustainability Insights & Analytics, Danske Bank. The discussion covered many aspects of the voluntary and regulatory reporting features, their dynamic, challenges and opportunities. As much of this regulation is still new and the industry is finding its way in the matrix of all the requirements, there is a need for synchronized terminology, but also having a common understanding of what different terminology means. Regulations might require disclosing factors that are not essential knowledge to investors, or demand disclosures that are not yet available. The ESG Disclosure Standards offer help on using specialized terms and descriptions in a harmonized way, and in this way create a good tool also to regulators globally. ESG reporting framework is still in the beginning phases and a lot needs to be done. The voluntary ESG Disclosure Standards have an important role in making the field more coherent, and lead the way in helping both investors and asset managers to “speak the same language”.