ClientEarth's complaint to the AMF on BlackRock's misleading marketing claims
PDF | 7112 kb
PDF | 7112 kb
In a regulatory complaint to the Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF), ClientEarth has challenged the misnaming of multiple BlackRock retail investment funds as ’sustainable’.
Building on analysis carried out by French organisation Reclaim Finance, ClientEarth identified 18 actively managed retail investment funds marketed in France and across Europe and UK with ‘sustainable’ in their names which collectively hold more than US$1 billion of fossil fuel investment.
The funds have fossil fuel exposures of between 1% and 27% of their assets under management, the majority of which is in companies expanding or developing new fossil fuel capacity.
ClientEarth is calling for a strong enforcement response from the French regulator to ensure transparency and protection for investors.
It also calls on BlackRock to clean up its ‘sustainable’ funds by divesting these investments in fossil fuels, or at the very least accept that it can’t keep calling funds ‘sustainable’ while they direct funds to fossil fuel expansion or companies that fail to comply with the Paris Agreement temperature goals.
Lawyers also argued that any enforcement action or change in marketing of these funds in France be replicated across European and UK markets.