The need for climate risk disclosure

Globe & Mail – Canadian securities regulators struggled this summer when they decided to issue new guidance on climate change-related disclosures for issuers. The regulators were clearly searching for a way to provide investors with useful information on an unprecedented systemic risk while still working within our existing continuous disclosure framework.

Sadly, the results of that struggle came up short, largely because regulators shied away from actually regulating. Instead, they chose to merely “clarify” existing regulatory requirements, trapping themselves (and all of us) in a framework for disclosure that is simply not fit for purpose.