The financed emissions and lack of consistent transition policies of the five largest banks active on the Swedish market put them at odds with their own stated long-term net-zero targets. This is the conclusion of a new report published on 24 January 2024 by Fair Finance Guide and the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation.
The reports authors focused on the financed emissions of the credit portfolios of SEB, Nordea, Danske Bank, Swedbank, and Handelsbanken. Until the European Union’s (EU) Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) makes Scope 3 reporting mandatory in 2025, banks are only required to report Scope 1 and 2 emissions, which typically account for a very small portfolio of the total carbon footprint. According to Fair Finance, Scope 3 emissions accounted for 99.9% of Nordea’s 2022 carbon footprint. The methodology used in the report therefore employs estimates and proxies to fill this data gap.
