It did not matter to climate change activists that Citigroup and Bank of America held their annual shareholder meetings online this year. Protesters showed up at the banks’ offices anyway to rail against fossil fuel lending. Extinction Rebellion demonstrated outside Citigroup’s headquarters in Tribeca in New York in late April. And at the same time, activists challenged the financiers walking into Bank of America’s Bryant Park offices.
Apparently, the noisiness fell on deaf ears. This year, shareholder resolutions at Citi and BofA demanding the banks stop financing new fossil fuel projects won less support than they did in 2022.
The shift echoes a broader trend in other types of climate-related votes. Across corporate America, there are signs of scepticism over so-called Say on Climate votes asking shareholders to approve climate transition strategies, says Glass Lewis, a shareholder advisory firm. It says while shareholders of US companies were among the first to propose a Say on Climate vote in 2021, none of these proposals were approved, with support ranging from 7 per cent to 39 per cent.