This week, the FCA and the City of London Corporation held a demo day for its Sustainability Cohort initiative, which aims to further green the financial sector and catalyse the transition to net zero.
Catherine McGuinness, policy chair, City of London Corporation, says of the demo day: "This is hugely exciting news that shows once again why London is a world-leading centre for green finance, with the public and private sectors working together to drive progress. This group of companies will help to create a greener financial sector and aid the transition to net zero by addressing common challenges, including issues such as ESG data and disclosure."
The Sustainability Cohort initiative - running 4 November 2021 to 31 March 2022 - is designed to address three of the biggest challenges facing ESG information and disclosure today:
- Understanding the data - How can technology help consumers understand the ESG characteristics of the products and providers they engage with?
- Automating and validating the data - How can technology automate the assurance of a listed issuer’s ESG data and validation of its ESG-labelled corporate bond issuance?
- Transparency in ESG disclosures and reporting - How can technology increase transparency in sustainability reporting, particularly when it comes to corporate assets and supply chains?
To workshop these challenges, the City of London Corporation and the FCA have re-opened their Digital Sandbox, within which 12 firms are developing unique solutions. All these solutions were showcased on the demo day.
Key features of the sandbox include access to financial data sets to develop, test and train models and PoCs; an API marketplace to access, connect and test with a catalogue of existing fintech and regtech APIs; access to an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) for code development and data analytics; and opportunities to collaborate with a network of innovators, regulators, financial services firms, and investors.
Notable projects to emerge from the sandbox include QPQ - a deep tech company that leverages supply chain data to help prevent greenwashing - and Coriolis, which has developed a digital platform that enables banks to monitor the ESG health of companies, supply chains and nations.
Participants in the Sustainability Cohort Demo Day - which included market players, end-consumers, sustainability experts, investors, academics, consultants, investment managers, third-party organisations, and regulators - wait with bated breath to see how the solutions proposed within the sandbox continue to develop this quarter.