Climate Risk, Credit Risk, and ECB Collateral

In a CEP Discussion Note, Pierre Monnin argues that financial markets mis-price climate related credit risk. If this were corrected some securities held by the ECB would loose their investment grade credit rating.

Assessing climate risks requires methodologies based on forward-looking scenarios, on complex cause-and-effect linkages and on data that has not been observed in the past. Such models are at their infancy, but already offer meaningful insights. This note provides an overview of key components that such models are built on and illustrates them with examples of the analytics that are already available. It also applies one of the available methodologies to assess transition risk to the corporate bond holdings of the European Central Bank.