ESG Currents

Green-bond rules are spreading across governments, but fragmentation may emerge as a hurdle for sustainable finance. Different legal frameworks across jurisdictions are raising questions about how issuers and investors can move capital across borders without added complexity. On this week’s ESG Currents, Aldo Romani, head of sustainable finance, and Tomomitsu Maruta, sustainable finance officer, both in the Finance Directorat...

As climate change intensifies, physical risks to property are mounting. On this episode of ESG Currents, Bloomberg Intelligence sustainable-finance senior analysts Gail Glazerman and Andy Stevenson speak with Daryl Fairweather, chief economist of Redfin, about how homebuyers are responding to physical risks, the challenges for home affordability — especially insurance costs — and how markets are adapting, including sign...

How does a sustainability focus support a pension fund's duty to safeguard the retirement future of a country's workers? What does effective engagement with companies look like? In this ESG Currents episode, Shahida Jaffar, Head of Corporate Sustainability at Malaysia’s Employees Provident Fund, joins Bloomberg Intelligence ESG analyst Conrad Tan to discuss the key principles guiding EPF's engagement with investee companies a...

Global costs related to climate events, including damage, insurance premiums, maintenance and repair, have exceeded $20 trillion since the year 2000, according to Bloomberg Intelligence’s Climate Damages Tracker. This massive wealth transfer provides the context for BI’s Climate Economy 2026 Outlook report. On this week’s episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Andy Stevenson, BI senior climate analyst and lead autho...

Emerging markets are central to the global sustainability transition and increasingly at the forefront of innovation in sustainable finance, from debt-for-food swaps to biodiversity-linked sovereign bonds. On this week’s episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Nicolas Jaquier, a portfolio manager on the emerging markets fixed income team at Ninety One, where he co-manages the Emerging Market Sustainable Blend strategy, joins Blo...

Water demand is set to outpace supply by 40% by 2030, and scarcity is spurring broad changes across the global economy, giving rise to companies that aim to provide solutions for the growing crisis. On this week’s episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Tom Ferguson, founder and managing partner of Burnt Island Ventures, joins Eric Kane, Bloomberg Intelligence’s director of ESG research, to discuss emerging opportunities i...

Japan’s Corporate Governance Code, first introduced in 2015, has driven significant changes across the market – strengthening shareholder value, enhancing investor engagement, protecting minority rights, promoting gender diversity, and supporting the transition to a decarbonized economy. A further revision expected in 2026 could accelerate progress across these areas.

In this episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Yasunor...

Outcome bonds link investor returns to measurable results and are seeing increased issuance, led by institutions like the World Bank. In this ESG Currents episode, Bloomberg Intelligence ESG analysts Melanie Rua and Chris Ratti speak with Jorge Familiar of the World Bank Group and Stephen Liberatore of Nuveen Asset Management about how these structures are scaling. The discussion focuses on how investors price outcome risk alongsid...

Carbon pricing is at the heart of Japan’s decarbonization strategy. With a government-backed initiative covering about 60% of national emissions and the full launch of the Green Transformation (GX) Emissions Trading System in 2026, Japan’s carbon market is entering a pivotal phase.

In this episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Yuki Mori, General Manager of the Japan Exchange Group’s Carbon Credit Market, joins Bloo...

Two experts, one question: Is climate risk already priced in? On this week’s episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Bloomberg Intelligence EMEA ESG integration analyst Grace Osborne hosts an Oxford-style debate. Dr. Jakob Thomae, co-founder and CEO of Theia Finance Labs, argues for the motion, while Dr. Ben Caldecott, founding director of the Oxford Sustainable Finance Group and a coordinating lead author on finance for the IPC...

The Greenhouse Gas Protocol has become the de facto market standard for measuring and reporting carbon emissions. But does its focus on enterprise-wide reporting really lead to optimal decision-making? Carbon Measures, a coalition of industrial firms, is developing a new framework for product-level carbon accounting. On this week’s episode of ESG Currents, Bloomberg Intelligence Senior ESG Analyst Rob Du Boff speaks with Amy ...

Sustainability is moving beyond high-level ESG rhetoric and becoming more embedded in how investment mandates and RFPs are structured — but what is actually changing in practice? In this episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Sarika Goel, global head of sustainable investment manager research at Mercer, joins Bloomberg Intelligence Senior ESG Analyst Shaheen Contractor to unpack how sustainability expectations are shifting with...

As climate volatility intensifies, water risk is becoming a critical — and often mispriced — factor in investment decisions, particularly across agriculture and real assets. In this episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Bloomberg Intelligence’s Melanie Rua speaks with Catherine Burns of The Nature Conservancy’s NatureVest team and Alyssa Go of RRG Capital Management about how institutional capital is integrat...

Private markets are becoming an increasingly important frontier for sustainable investing, with mounting interest among allocators and a rapidly evolving landscape. But where are the real opportunities — and how can investors separate substance from storytelling? In this episode of ESG Currents, Northern Trust Asset Management’s Head of Multi-Asset Custom Solutions, Dee Sharma, joins Bloomberg Intelligence Senior ESG An...

Plastic waste is a mounting challenge around the globe, but nuance required to understand and manage plastic is often ignored. On this episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Svanika Balasubramanian, founder and chief circularity officer of rePurpose Global, joins BI senior integration analyst Gail Glazerman to discuss the scale of the problem, potential key performance indicators (KPIs) to assess plastic exposure and strategies to ma...

Insurance is essential for the carbon-credit market to unlock capital, manage risk and build trust. On this week’s episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Natalia Dorfman, CEO and co-founder of Kita, joins Eric Kane, director of ESG research at Bloomberg Intelligence, to discuss how her company provides insurance products that aim to unlock institutional investment for high-integrity carbon removal and natural-capital projects. ...

Mangroves are one of the most powerful natural tools for climate adaptation and resilience, protecting coastlines, stabilizing economies and strengthening ecosystems. On this episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Ignace Beguin Billecocq, executive director of the Mangrove Breakthrough, joins BI senior ESG credit analyst Chris Ratti. The Mangrove Breakthrough is a global initiative aiming to secure the future of 15 million hectares o...

Can cutting methane leaks help fuel the rising energy demand from AI data centers? On this episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Carl Pope, former Sierra Club executive director, and Last Mile Production CEO Zach Wagner join BI climate analyst Andrew Stevenson to discuss how leaking and vented methane has the potential to help meet Texas’ surging power demand. Methane leaks are a major source of greenhouse gas emissions, and c...

Blended finance uses catalytic capital from public or philanthropic sources to mobilize private investment toward sustainable development — but how are these vehicles structured, and what enables them to scale? On this week’s episode of the ESG Currents podcast, Timothee Jaulin, head of responsible investment development & advocacy at Amundi, joins Shaheen Contractor, senior ESG analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, to...