More than $400 billion. This is the value of investments by asset managers around the world in hydrocarbon producers, denounces the NGO Carbon Tracker in a study published Friday. The authors analyzed the investments of financial firms that are among the shareholders of 15 large private companies in the hydrocarbon sector such as the British BP, the American ExxonMobil or the French TotalEnergies.

None of these fossil fuel giants are "aligned" with a goal of limiting global warming to 1.5°C compared to the pre-industrial period, according to Carbon Tracker, which takes as a reference the most ambitious goal of the 2015 Paris Agreement.

Commitments that go up in smoke

Among managers, a number of US groups stand out for their significant investments in oil and gas companies, such as the giant BlackRock (with an oil and gas asset value of $116 billion in 2022). Others like the French Amundi (12 billion) are also pinned.

The authors note that many of them have officially committed to the climate front, notably by joining the Net Zero Asset Managers Initiative (NZAM). The latter aims to "support the goal of net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 or earlier, in line with efforts to limit warming to 1.5°C". These include BlackRock, JPMorgan, UBS, Amundi, BNP Paribas and Lazard.

Over $400 billion

By focusing on the managers who are members of this initiative, Carbon Tracker calculates that the value of their investments in the oil and gas sector reaches nearly $417 billion. This is the total for the 25 NZAM member financial groups most exposed to the hydrocarbon sector. Carbon Tracker notes that many of them have even increased their exposure to the fossil fuel sector between 2021 and 2022, whose profits have been inflated for more than a year by the war in Ukraine.

NZAM managers are "signaling to the market that they will invest in line with the Paris Agreement's goal of limiting warming to 1.5°C," said Maeve O'Connor, author of the report. But "if they invest in oil and gas companies that are not aligned with this goal, they risk their reputation with the owners of the assets who care about the climate issue," she warns. "Other investors may also be concerned about their exposure to risks related to the energy transition," she adds, as some fossil assets risk losing their value with the rise of other forms of cleaner energy.

  • Environment
  • Planet
  • Petroleum
  • Hydrocarbons
  • Climate