THE GROUPE BPCE CLIMATE REPORT OCTOBER 2021

1 - The Group is stepping up itscommitment to the fight against climate change

  • Groupe BPCE has made climate change a priority for all its business lines and companies:
    • It undertakes to assist all its customers in meeting their own environment-related transformation challenges and fully intends to make the environmental transition one of its main growth drivers within the framework of its strategic plan, BPCE 2024.
    • It commits to aligning its portfolios with a ‘Net Zero’ trajectory by prioritizing those portfolios where the bank can have the greatest impact, i.e. those with the largest proportion of the most greenhouse gas intensive sectors.
    • It wants to be exemplary and reduce the carbon footprint of its own operations by 15% within three years.
  • Groupe BPCE has set up a robust system to identify and manage climate risk factors liable to have an impact on its activities.

1 - The Group is stepping up its commitment to the fight against climate change

The need to combat climate change and create a more low-carbon society is the defining challenge of our time and - more than ever before - a matter of absolute priority. To meet this challenge, the financial industry has a key role to play in facilitating the transition to a low-carbon economy capable of accommodating the various environmental, social and economic needs of society. Groupe BPCE, a financial institution playing a key role in the financing of the French economy, has been mobilized in pursuit of this objective for many years. Thanks to its strong presence throughout France and around the world, it supports all types of economic players - individuals, professionals, companies, associations, public entities, local authorities, and investors - with its financing and refinancing expertise along with investment and savings solutions to help them to bring their transformation and transition projects to fruition.

The environmental transition is central to its preoccupations and, as such, one of the three pillars of BPCE 2024, the Group’s new strategic plan for 2021-2024, and a priority action area for all its business lines and companies. In this context, Groupe BPCE intends to commit to a long term adjustment of its balance sheet in line with a strategy of mitigating the climate impact of the activities it pursues and the assets it finances, invests in, or insures. As such, it is making a strong commitment to its customers and society at large: to align its financing portfolios with a ‘Net Zero’ trajectory, i.e. carbon neutrality by 2050. Groupe BPCE has reasserted this commitment by joining the Net Zero Banking Alliance, the world’s largest initiative aimed at achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 currently supported by 53 different banking institutions.

An environmentally committed group, a ‘Net Zero’ group

For Groupe BPCE, joining the Net Zero Banking Alliance means aligning its portfolios with a trajectory leading to net-zero emissions by 2050… but it also means taking immediate action to use the measurement tools at its disposal to establish milestones for the short-, medium- and long-term alignment of its balance sheet with this target.

  • For the financing portfolios of the Corporate & Investment Banking division, the business line that finances the most emission-intensive sectors, the 2050 target is 1.5°C with two intermediate milestones: 2.5°C in 2024 and 2.2°C in 2030.
  • For the Natixis Assurances main insurance fund, the target for 2030 is 1.5°C with an intermediate milestone of 2°C in 2024.