Can responsible investment deliver real change? 1/2

The rising tide of interest in environmental and local issues is guiding CNP Assurances’ efforts to live up to its responsibility as a large-scale and long-term investor.

Although responsible investment has really taken off recently, CNP Assurances has long been an active proponent of the approach. Because insuring people for the past 170 years has given us a keen sense of our responsibility to society. Because our strategy is naturally guided by the common good as we are a public-sector company. Because investing hundreds of billions of euros in savings gives us real clout. And because in today’s world policyholders want to know how their money is being used.

We first adopted an ESG approach and screened our entire equity portfolio using environmental, social and governance filters back in 2006. Then exclusions were incorporated, firstly for anti-personnel mine manufacturers in 2008, then for offshore financial centres in 2014, for coal in 2015 and finally for tobacco companies in 2020, to sharpen up the ethical footprint of our investments.

We rallied to the climate cause in 2015, setting ambitious targets for green investments, pulling out of thermal coal and decarbonising our asset portfolios. We reached and even exceeded most of them ahead of schedule and have raised the bar even further to support the energy and environment transition.

The real economy is another focal point for us. At year-end 2019, €131 billion in policyholders’ savings flowed into the French economy, with close to €4.5 billion channelled into SMEs and job-creating startups across the regions, and into the property and infrastructure that are making France more competitive.

€20 billion in green investments is what CNP Assurances has pledged to make by 2023