Bank shareholders vote down climate-change proposals

Proposals at annual shareholder meetings for Citigroup, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo would have pushed management to curb lending for projects in oil and gas. Between 11% and 12.8% of votes were in favor.

Why should we care?
Though these results may suggest tepid interest in climate change-mitigating efforts among these banks’s shareholders, some activists interpret these votes as a relative success. “These resolutions are unprecedented; this situation generally produces smaller votes the first time out,” said Paul Rissman, a board member at the Sierra Club Foundation, which filed the proposal at Wells Fargo. The proposals received enough votes to qualify for rediscussion next year, which gives activist shareholders enough time to attempt to sway particularly influential investors. But other advocates have expressed a need for greater urgency. “Investors are saying we can’t conduct business in a world that is on fire, that has heatwaves and insufficient water,” said Danielle Fugere, president of As You Sow, a shareholder advocacy group . “And I do think companies are beginning to understand that it’s in their interest to take action and that shareholders support that action.” Loren Blackford, who spearheads the Sierra Foundation’s investment committee, cited credit losses and higher capital requirements as two of the potential consequences of inadequate climate change-mitigation for banks—not to mention the existential threat of ecological collapse. Proposals at all three banks aligned with the International Energy Agency’s plan toward a net-zero future, which states that “no investment in new fossil fuel supply projects” is the only way to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit). Activists have seen some success in the past, ousting Lee Raymond, former CEO of Exxon Mobil, from JPMorgan’s board. They’ll continue applying pressure from the bottom-up as well as the top-down.