At least three Danish institutional investors support a shareholder resolution urging Nordea, the Nordic region's biggest bank, to stop financing companies expanding Arctic oil and gas production due to environmental risks.
Pension funds Akademiker, Sampension and Velliv told Reuters of their voting intentions ahead of the bank's annual general meeting on Tuesday.
The activist motion comes amid the oil shock driven by the Iran war and after Norway announced plans for increased drilling in its offshore Arctic region.
The resolution targets Norwegian energy companies Equinor, Aker BP and Var Energi, which are involved in Arctic exploration and drilling.
'HIGH ENVIRONMENTAL RISK'
It urges Nordea to align with Nordic rivals Danske Bank, Swedbank, Handelsbanken, Nykredit and OP Financial Group in stopping lending to companies expanding oil and gas activities north of the Arctic Circle.
"The vulnerable Arctic ecosystems are at risk of becoming the new centre of Norwegian oil and gas production," said one of the proposal's writers, Katrine Ehnhuus, senior adviser at the Nordic Center for Sustainable Finance.
Nordea said it does not provide dedicated finance for oil and gas expansion or Arctic drilling but will continue to provide funding to certain companies.
"We continue to support a few carefully selected companies that play an important role in ensuring affordable and secure energy supply in Europe," it said in an emailed statement.
Nordea is one of 19 banks participating in a $5 billion revolving credit facility for Equinor, which "serves as a backstop facility for the group's borrowing in the U.S. Commercial Paper market," Equinor said in its debt presentation.
Velliv's head of responsible investments, Ulla Benediktson, said it was key to target new expansion projects and not existing supply, which she said was important for Europe's energy security.
"Arctic exploration involves high environmental risk, long lead times, and substantial stranded-asset exposure in a market where European oil and gas demand is projected to decline," she told Reuters.
Sampension said it would vote in favour of the resolution because "it appears that the company has not provided shareholders with a sufficiently transparent picture of its activities related to the financing of fossil fuel expansion".
(Reuters)
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