March 28, 2024

As Winter Sweeps the South, Fed Officials Focus on Climate Change

“We would note that it has long been the policy of the Federal Reserve to not dictate to banks what lawful industries they can and cannot serve, as those business decisions should be made solely by each institution,” they wrote last month.

Mr. Powell and Mr. Quarles echoed the lawmakers’ assertion that the Fed’s bank stress tests measured bank capital needs over a much shorter time frame than climate change, though they said the Fed was working to help banks manage their risks, including those related to climate.

The central bank is quickly moving toward greater activism on the topic. Its Supervision Climate Committee, announced last month, will work “to develop an appropriate program” to supervise banks’s climate-related risks, Ms. Brainard said Thursday. The Fed is also co-chair of a task force on climate-related financial risks at the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, a global regulatory group.

Though the central bank is politically independent, President Biden has placed climate at the center of his administration’s economic priorities. Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen has pledged to “fight the climate crisis.

Ms. Brainard, the Fed’s last remaining governor appointed by President Barack Obama, has been a leading voice in pushing for greater attention to climate issues, speaking on the matter at a conference in 2019. So has Mary C. Daly, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, who held that conference.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/18/business/economy/federal-reserve-climate-change-banks.html

Speak Your Mind