Top Stories

Sustainable finance players are enthusiastic about regulation, which they expect to bring clarity and order to the market. It may — though when the new EU rules are implemented they are likely to irk participants more than they expect. But what would be really effective are direct actions that bypass finance.

Credit Suisse’s outgoing chief executive Tidjane Thiam thought he could win the power struggle against chairman Urs Rohner but he overlooked the real power broker — Severin Schwan.

Natixis, one of the investment banks that has gone furthest to prioritise greener financing, had to ramp up its provisions for credit loss from US natural gas producers in the fourth quarter, pointing to “structural transformation” in the sector. But it told GlobalCapital that it still saw opportunity in the industry.

The departure of Tidjane Thiam as chief executive of Credit Suisse on Friday caused the bank’s share price to fall, but analysts believe the firm’s strategy is likely to remain largely unchanged.

The European securities regulator will start to probe sustainable finance, looking for risks including greenwashing and climate risks, and may use stress tests in some market segments. Green finance experts welcomed the new Strategy on Sustainable Finance put out by the European Securities and Markets Authority on Thursday as a step towards fully integrating environmental, social and governance issues into financial regulation.

A first sign of whether the UK will choose to diverge from EU financial regulation after Brexit could come when mandatory buy-in rules enter into force. This is because the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) has proposed postponing the rules that govern what happens when a securities trade fails until February 2021, after the Brexit transition period ends.

Interdealer brokers are facing potential disruption after a new platform, AiX, announced its intention this week to compete for their fees with artificial intelligence technology that aims to replace some of the functions of human brokers.

Société Générale grew revenues while keeping costs steady in its markets and investor services activities in the fourth quarter. Bondholders will have also welcomed a boost to the bank’s capital ratio.

Stephen Moss and Nuno Matos have been given new roles of responsibility for Europe at HSBC, ahead of expected restructuring of the group in that region, particularly in global banking and markets (GBM).

BNP Paribas expects to buck the trend of malaise at European investment banks and grow its revenues this year, it said in its fourth quarter results on Wednesday.

The Bank for International Settlements published a paper this week in which it suggested that supervisory authorities might need to introduce ‘prudential backstops’ to ensure that banks are valuing Level 3 assets appropriately.

Bank of America has appointed Snigdha Singh to head up its rates trading team for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.