Methodology
Investing in Climate Chaos reveals which institutional investors hold bonds and shares of coal, oil, and gas companies as of May 2024.
Fossil Fuel Companies
Financial Institutions
Additional Notes
Researchers
Fossil Fuel Companies
Company Scope
The scope of the financial research included all companies from Urgewald’s Global Coal Exit List (GCEL) and Global Oil and Gas Exit List (GOGEL). This includes parent companies and subsidiaries that are also in the fossil fuel business or that are pure financial vehicles. Data is aggregated at the company parent level. Note that some companies appear both on the GCEL and the GOGEL. If data is presented separately for GCEL / GOGEL companies, the investment values cannot be tallied up as this would double-count some investments.
Coal Companies
Companies on the GCEL represent over 90% of the world’s thermal coal production and the world’s coal-fired capacity. GCEL offers statistics on over 1,400 parent companies and over 1,900 subsidiaries operating along the thermal coal value chain (coal exploration, processing, trading, transport and logistics, equipment manufacturing, mining, power production, etc.). GCEL does not cover coal used for cement or steel production. The metrics displayed in our company profiles are from GCEL. GCEL data is based on company reportings and NGO information and mainly refers to 2022. You can read the detailed GCEL methodology here.
Oil and Gas Companies
GOGEL lists over 1,600 oil and gas companies operating in the upstream, midstream or gas-fired power sector. The database covers 95% of oil and gas production, 97% of short-term upstream expansion, and 93% of capital expenditure on oil and gas exploration. You can read more about the GOGEL data here.
Notes on Companies
Financial data is not available for all companies that were theoretically in scope. Reasons for this are manifold, e.g., national companies are not publicly traded, hence there is no shareholding data. Some ownership forms may dominate in certain sectors and are more prominent in some countries.
Selected companies were removed from the scope. BHP Group was removed due to its exit plan for thermal coal. You can read more about what we consider to be a credible coal exit plan here. Power Finance Corporation recently cancelled its coal expansion plans; as the company does not meet GCEL criteria anymore now, it was removed from the scope. Teck Resources Ltd sold their oil and gas assets and was thus removed from the scope.
We acknowledge that shares in some Russian companies are currently not tradeable and investors might have written off respective holdings.
Mergers and acquisitions of companies: The company mapping deviates from that of the GCEL / GOGEL 2023 where large mergers and acquisitions took place. Companies affected by this include: Pioneer Natural Resources Company, Hess Corporation, Earthstone Energy Inc, Cimarex Energy Co, EP Energy Corporation, Oasis Petroleum Inc, PGNiG and QEP Resources Inc.
Financial Institutions
Financial Institutions' Scope
The research is focused on institutional investors. Institutional investors are companies or organisations that buy, sell and manage stocks and bonds on behalf of clients or members. Our research includes investors such as pension funds, insurance companies, asset managers, hedge funds, sovereign wealth funds, endowment funds, asset management arms and liquidity providers of commercial banks. Corporate, government and individual shareholders, as well as development banks are not included in the scope of this research.
Financial data is drawn from the commercial database Refinitiv (now known as LSEG Data & Analytics). For a selection of pension and sovereign wealth funds, data was collected from the fund disclosures and SEC filings in individual cases (see Sources below).
Investments have been aggregated on group level. Hence, for example asset manager Amundi is aggregated with its parent bank Crédit Agricole.
Some asset managers’ third-party investments as well as brokering services are included in the scope of this research.
Type of Financial Data
The research focuses on two types of securities: shares and bonds.
Shareholding
Shares are units of equity ownership in a company. They can be traded by shareholders on stock exchanges. Issuing shares on the stock exchange gives a company the opportunity to increase its equity by attracting a large number of new shareholders or increase the equity from its existing shareholders.
Shares can be bought and sold on the stock exchange from one moment to the next. Financial databases keep track of shareholdings through snapshots, or filings. The shareholding value or amount may have changed since the filing of a particular shareholding as the holding may have been sold or additional shares purchased. Share prices may also vary from one moment to the next.
Coverage of shareholding data can be considered almost complete.
Bondholding
A bond is essentially a small piece of a large loan that can be bought and traded separately. Bondholders are therefore creditors of a company. The buyer of each bond is entitled to repayment after a certain number of years, and to a certain interest during each of these years. Like shares, bonds can be traded on the stock exchange. The main difference between owning shares and bonds is that owners of a bond are not co-owners of the issuing company.
Bonds which are categorized as green bonds according to the database Refinitiv are excluded from the analysis. It should be noted that the ‘green finance’ label is highly contested, especially when it comes to companies also involved in the fossil fuel industry.
Bondholding coverage is not as complete as some investors don’t (need to) disclose their portfolio and/or it is not covered by the databases used. Coverage is estimated to be between 20-30%.
Notes on Financial Institutions
Mergers and acquisitions of investors: Mergers and acqusitions of investors / managers that overlap with the filing dates in this research may not be accurately reflected yet.
Investor structures: We note that not all managers are wholly-owned (100%) by their assigned investor parent. However, adding adjusters according to their ownership structure was not feasible.
Multi-manager funds: Holdings in multi-manager funds are sometimes incorrectly assigned to the largest manager of a fund in Refinitiv.
Database mistakes: We base our research on data drawn from Refinitiv (now known as LSEG Data & Analytics), a renown, global provider of financial market data. Sometimes, the data in Refinitiv contains mistakes that then make it into our dataset. If you think you may have spotted one, please get in touch with us.
Detailed Sources of Financial Data
Financial data is drawn from the commercial database Refinitiv (now known as LSEG Data & Analytics). For a selection of pension and sovereign wealth funds, data was collected from the fund disclosures and SEC filings in individual cases (see below). The selection was made based on the relative size of the fund, as well as availability of data.
Data reflects the most recent filing dates available at the time of research in May 2024. Data includes filing dates going back to June 2022; older filings were removed. Please note that investments might have changed since the data was retrieved.
The reporting of following pension funds and sovereign wealth funds is as of 31 December 2023: Active Super, AkademikerPension, Algemeen Burgerlijk Pensioenfonds (ABP), Andra AP-Fonden (AP-2), ATP Group, Australian Retirement Trust, Australian Super, Aware Super, Caisse de Dépôt et Placement du Québec (CDPQ), Cbus Super, Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation, Fjärde AP-Fonden (AP-4), Florida State Board of Administration (FSBA), Fonds de Compensation de la Sécurité Sociale, SICAV-FIS (FDC), Första AP-Fonden (AP-1), Future Fund, Government Pension Fund Global (GPFG), Government Pension Fund Norway (GPFN), KENFO (Fonds zur Finanzierung der kerntechnischen Entsorgung), Kommunal Landspensjonskasse (KLP), Laegernes Pensionskasse, Maine Public Employees Retirement System (MainePERS), Minnesota State Board of Investment (MSBI), New York State Teachers' Retirement System (NYSTRS), New Zealand Superannuation Fund, PenSam, Pensioenfonds Detailhandel, Pensioenfonds Horeca & Catering (PH&C), Pensioenfonds Metaal en Techniek (PMT), Pensioenfonds PGB (disclosure only includes top 50 holdings), Pensioenfonds Rail & Openbaar Vervoer, Pensioenfonds van de Metalektro (PME), Pensioenfonds Vervoer, PFA Group, Public Employees Retirement System of Mississippi (disclosure only includes top 10 domestic and top 10 international shareholdings), Sampension, Sjunde AP-Fonden (AP-7), Strathclyde Pension Fund, Super SA, TfL Pension Fund (disclosure only includes top 25 shareholdings), Tredje AP-Fonden (AP-3), UniSuper, Vision Super.
The reporting of following funds is as of 30 September 2023: Bedrijfstakpensioenfonds voor de Bouwnijverheid (BpfBOUW), Colorado Public Employees’ Retirement Association (Colorado PERA), Pensioenfonds voor de Woningcorporaties (SPW), Stichting Pensioenfonds voor Huisartsen, Universities Superannuation Scheme (disclosure only includes top 100 shareholdings)
The reporting of following funds is as of 30 June 2023: Arizona State Retirement System (disclosure only includes top 10 public equity holdings), California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS), California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS), Employees Retirements System of Georgia (disclosure only includes top 20 shareholdings and top 10 bondholdings), Los Angeles City Employees' Retirement System (LACERS) (disclosure only includes top 10 holdings), Maryland State Retirement & Pension System (disclosure only includes top 15 holdings), New York City Employees' Retirement System, Oklahoma Teachers' Retirement System (disclosure only includes top 10 share- and bondholdings), Oregon Public Employees Retirement System, Teachers Retirement System of Georgia (disclosure only includes top 20 shareholdings and top 10 bondholdings), University of California Retirement Plan
The reporting of following funds is as of 31 March 2023: Federation of National Public Service Personnel Mutual Aid Associations, Government Employees Pension Fund, Government Pension Investment Fund, Japan Mutual Aid Association of Public School Teachers, Mutual Benefit Association for Tokyo Metropolitan Government Employees, New York State Common Retirement Fund, Pension Fund Association for Local Government Officials, West Yorkshire Pension Fund,
The reporting of following funds is as of 31 December 2022: B.C. Teachers Pension Plan (disclosure only includes top 25 holdings), BPL Pensioen, National Pension Service, Orange County Employees Retirement System (disclosure incomplete, only includes largest holdings), Pension Fund ING Group, Pensionskasse Post, State of Wisconsion Investment Board
Following funds have other filing dates: British Columbia Investment Management (15 May 2024), Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (31 March 2024 and 14 May 2024); Fonds de Réserve pour les Retraites (FRR) (29 December 2023); Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan (13 May 2024); Massachusetts Pension Reserves Investments Management (30 January 2024); Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (31 December 2023 and 10 May 2024); Pensioenfonds Zorg en Welzijn (PFZW) (31 January 2024; note that PFZW published a divestment announcement since); PensionDanmark (17 January 2024); Pensionskassernes Administration (PKA) (25 January 2024); State Universities Retirement System of the State of Illinois (31 January 2024).
Additional Notes
Regions
The regional distribution is based on the “Standard country or area codes for statistical use (M49)” list issued by UN Statistics Division with some minor amendments. The African continent is further broken down based on the regional definition of the African Union.
Comparability to previous research
Numbers from Investing in Climate Chaos 2024 are not comparable to previous versions of this research due to significant changes made to the scope of researched companies.
More fossil fuel finance research
Financing from the 60 biggest banks to fossil fuel companies can be found in the report Banking on Climate Chaos, released by a coalition of NGOs, led by Rainforest Action Network and co-published by Urgewald. A detailed research of coal banks worldwide is accessible in Urgewald’s Still Banking on Coal report. Detailed information on controversial assets in mutual funds and ETFs traded on the German market is available at faire-fonds.info. Further analysis of listed financial institutions’ coal and oil & gas policies can be found in the Coal Policy Tracker and the Oil & Gas Policy Tracker by the NGO Reclaim Finance.
Researchers
The financial research was conducted by Profundo, a not-for-profit research institute based in the Netherlands.
The compilation and the analysis of the data were done by Urgewald's Finance Research Team. For further questions, please contact financeresearch@urgewald.org. We are also able to supply analysis for more complicated requests and in different formats – get in touch!