The Sustainable Finance RPN was established in June 2021. The network has been merged in 2024 with the Climate Change and the Environment Programme Area. 

Primary markets increasingly direct funding – both equity and debt - to companies that invest in sustainable technologies and embrace sustainable management practices. Secondary market trading based on sustainability factors causes stock prices to reflect such factors rather than purely financial concerns. In addition to capital allocation, investors can also improve sustainability through voting and engagement. To fulfil these functions, investors and lenders need information on companies’ sustainability performance and impact. Key is to take a sufficiently long horizon because sustainability is about the future.

The theoretical and policy challenge is to integrate financial, social and environmental factors into decision-making and reporting. The Sustainable Finance RPN pursues a broad agenda covering topics in investment analysis (price formation, portfolio-selection, engagement and voting), corporate finance (investment decisions, employee and board compensation and corporate governance), banking (lending decisions, credit risk analysis and loan covenants), corporate reporting (emerging sustainable reporting standards, impact measurement and assurance) and financial regulation (taxonomy, fiduciary duty and capital adequacy framework). Reflecting the growing concerns around climate change and reacting to the huge financial sector interest in ESG issues and impact measurement, the aim of this RPN was to foster research in the area of sustainable finance and to make it mainstream.

Leadership of the RPN was supported by a Steering Committee:- Patrick Bolton (Imperial College London and Columbia University), Alex Edmans (London Business School) and Stefan Reichelstein (University of Mannheim and Stanford University). 

Members

Jean Boissinot

Deputy Director, Financial Stability Banque De France; Head of Secretariat Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS)

Ralph De Haas

Director of Research European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD); Part-time Professor of Finance Ku Leuven

Alissa Kleinnijenhuis

Visiting Assistant Professor of Finance at the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business Cornell University; Imperial College Business School Finance Department Imperial College London

Roman Kräussl

Professor of Finance Bayes Business School (formerly Cass); Visiting Fellow Hoover Institution, Stanford University

Christian Leuz

Charles F. Pohl Distinguished Service Professor of Accounting and Finance, University of Chicago's Booth School of Business University Of Chicago

RPN Member, European Financial Architecture / Fellow, Banking and Corporate Finance / Fellow, Climate Change and the Environment

Sophie Moinas

Professor of Finance, IAE Toulouse School of Management Toulouse 1 Capitole University

Kjell G. Nyborg

Senior Chair Swiss Finance Institute; Chaired Professor of Finance, Department of Banking and Finance University Of Zurich

Martin Oehmke

Professor of Finance London School Of Economics And Political Science

RPN Member, European Financial Architecture / Fellow, Banking and Corporate Finance / Fellow, Climate Change and the Environment

Lasse Heje Pedersen

Professor of Finance Copenhagen Business School; Distinguished Visiting Research Professor at the Stern School of Business New York University

Lucrezia Reichlin

Fellow British Academy; Fellow Econometric Society; Chair of the fellows IFRS International Financial Reporting Standards Foundation; Professor of Economics London Business School

Fellow, Monetary Economics and Fluctuations / RPN Member, European Economic Policy / Distinguished Fellow / RPN Member, Geoeconomics / Fellow, Climate Change and the Environment

Nick Robins

Professor in Practice - Sustainable Finance London School Of Economics And Political Science

Frederic Samama

Head of Responsible Investment Amundi; Head of Strategic Development, Sustainable1 S&P Global

Zacharias Sautner

Senior Chair Swiss Finance Institute; Professor of Sustainable Finance University Of Zurich

RPN Member, European Financial Architecture / Fellow, Climate Change and the Environment

Isabel Schnabel

Member of the Executive Board European Central Bank; Professor of Financial Economics (on leave) University Of Bonn

Henri Servaes

Richard Brealey Professor of Corporate Governance and Professor of Finance London Business School

Romain Svartzman

Research Fellow Bocconi University; Senior Executive Fellow SDA Bocconi School of Management; Honorary Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose University College London

Ulrich Volz

Senior Research Fellow German Institute Of Development And Sustainability; Visiting Professor at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment London School Of Economics And Political Science; Professor of Economics and Director of the Centre for Sustainable Finance Soas University Of London

Beatrice Weder di Mauro

President Professor of Global Economics, Climate and Nature Finance Geneva Graduate Institute (iheid); Visiting Professor Hoffmann Global Institute for Business and Society INSEAD

CEPR President / RPN Member, European Economic Policy / RPN Member, International Lending and Sovereign Debt / RPN Member, Geoeconomics / Fellow, Climate Change and the Environment

Josef Zechner

Co-Head of Research Institute for Capital Markets and Professor of Finance and Investments Wu Vienna University Of Economics And Business

Steering Committee

Patrick Bolton

Barbara and David Zalaznick Professor Emeritus of Business and Professor Emeritus of Economics Finance Columbia University; Professor of Finance Imperial College London

Stefan Reichelstein

Senior Fellow Precourt Institute for Energy; Senior Fellow Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research; The William R. Timken Professor of Accounting, Emeritus Senior Fellow, Precourt Institute for Energy Stanford University; Senior Fellow Woods Institute for the Environment

Fellow, Climate Change and the Environment

RPN Events

Past events

Symposium 2023 banner
Conference

CEPR Paris Symposium

CEPR Paris Symposium 2023

8 Dec 2023 - 13 Dec 2023 in Paris, France

Project news

Symposium 2023 banner
Conference

CEPR Paris Symposium

CEPR Paris Symposium 2023

8 Dec 2023 - 13 Dec 2023 in Paris, France

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Video

Sustainable Finance RPN - Decarbonizing Large Portfolios

The Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) Research Policy Network (RPN) on Sustainable Finance organized a Webinar on Decarbonizing Large Portfolios on Monday, 12 June 2023, 05:00-06:30 PM (CEST) with Patrick Bolton (Columbia Business School, CEPR & RPN Steering Committee Member) and Dirk Schoenmaker (Erasmus University Rotterdam, CEPR & RPN Leader).

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Video

Sustainable Finance RPN - Decarbonizing Large Portfolios

The Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) Research Policy Network (RPN) on Sustainable Finance organized a Webinar on Decarbonizing Large Portfolios on Monday, 12 June 2023, 05:00-06:30 PM (CEST) with Patrick Bolton (Columbia Business School, CEPR & RPN Steering Committee Member) and Dirk Schoenmaker (Erasmus University Rotterdam, CEPR & RPN Leader).

Scaling up sustainable finance
Book

Scaling Up Sustainable Finance and Investment in the Global South