Some further details about EIB's latest climate bond:
1. 60% of the entire transaction went to "socially responsible investors".
2. Investors were 32% from Benelux, 30% Germany, 22% France, 8% elsewhere in Europe and 8% from Asia. (UK investors don't make up much, falling into the 8% which make up the rest of Europe.)
3. Asset managers made up 38% of buyers, banks 35%, insurance and pension funds 15% and central banks and official institutions 13%.
4. It's the largest EUR denominated climate/green-labelled bond to date.
5. The sale window lasted from 9.40 CET until 3.20pm. Short, but apparently not unusual.
(BTW, it's been 8 months since the last EIB Climate Awareness bond, not the 15 month I had reported; I'd missed a Scandi issue last October).
The EIB and its underwriters seem to have had no problem placing the bond, which is great news. Mind you, not everyone was happy: one big investor told me they had wanted to buy the bond for their mainstream funds (i.e. a larger pool of capital than their purely 'ethical' (sic) money) but their dealers were of the view that pricing needed to deliver a premium they said would be "standard for any new bond issue". Given the successful placement I guess we can say "the market has spoken", but what do you think of this view?
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We're holding a meeting in Sydney tomorrow to explore the setting up of an Australian Climate Bonds Pooled Funds working group, flowing on from the work our northern hemisphere Pooled Funds working group has been doing. The agenda ranges from whether there are are opportunities to bring renewable energy loans into covered bonds legislation, to what could be done to generate green securitizations. Let me know if this is an issue of interest to you.
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FYI: our Climate Bonds Advisory Panel members are active in pressing home the message about climate bonds. We had two good examples in the past week: Prof. John Mathews in the Financial Times and Sean Flannery (with co-author Toby Couture) in Renewable Energy World.
