Defunding Putins War

Are you feeling upset but helpless as Ukraine’s war rumbles on? It might not be realistic to suddenly stop buying gas and you’re probably not in a position to pick up a gun and join the fight. And as you’ve found your way here, you were probably already concerned about climate change. How is one person supposed to confront these monumental issues?

Because of the ways that finance works, you’re not as helpless as you might feel.

It is fair to be upset, because the unfortunate fact is that your money probably provided financing for Gazprom, which is funding Putin’s bombs, which are dropping on cities and children and as you read this. That same money is also financing the climate crisis. Both are causing grain prices to spike, resulting in a food crisis that’s causing millions to go hungry, and contributing to a refugee crisis as the dominoes continue to tumble.

The following banks have all been financing Gazprom since 2016. If you have money at any of them, you inadvertently financed Gazprom and the war in Ukraine:

• JPMorgan Chase, $3.6 billion USD Gazprom financing since 2016
• UniCredit, $2.4 billion
• Sberbank, $2.4 billion
• Deutsche Bank, $1 billion
• Crédit Agricole, $977 million
• Intesa Sanpaolo, $356 million
• BPCE/Natixis, $200 million

Source: Banking on Climate Chaos 2021 report

In more ways than one, coal, oil, and gas are destroying our world. So, what can you do?

Your first priority should be leaving any bank that gives fossil fuel loans; tell the people in your life who value your advice to do the same. Then, you should be pressuring your banks, insurers, and pension funds not to underwrite or buy fossil fuel bonds. Later, you should sell any fossil fuel bonds you have. Lastly, you should ask your insurance companies not to insure fossil fuel infrastructure. (Insurance isn’t covered in this article because Bank.Green targets – you guessed it! – banks, but this Harvard Business Review article explains more.)

I’m unable to post the full article here, but if you would like you can go to https://bank.green/blog/how-to-defund-putin to get more detail as to why some financial strategies work — and why others don’t.

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