BNP Paribas AM Launches New Fossil-Free Fixed Income Funds

BNP Paribas Asset Management announced the expansion of its ESG fixed income ETF range, with the launch of the new BNP Paribas Easy € Corp Bond SRI Fossil Free Ultrashort Duration UCITS ETF and BNP Paribas Easy USD Corp Bond SRI Fossil Free UCITS ETF.

Each of the new funds are classified as Article 8 under the EU’s Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR). The funds have been listed on Euronext Paris, Borsa Italiana and Deutsche Börse Xetra.

BNP Paribas Easy € Corp Bond SRI Fossil Free Ultrashort Duration UCITS ETF replicates the performance of the Bloomberg MSCI Euro Corporate Ultrashort Fixed and Floating Rate SRI Index, which includes short duration fixed and floating-rate investment grade bonds with approximately 400 constituents, and applies MSCI’s sustainability criteria including value-based, controversial sectors and fossil fuel exclusions, ‘red flag’ ESG controversy exclusions, and the potential additional exclusion of the worst ESG-rated issuers.

BNP Paribas Easy USD Corp Bond SRI Fossil Free UCITS ETF is designed to replicate the performance of the Bloomberg MSCI US Corporate SRI Sustainable ex Fossil Fuel Bond Index, an investment grade bond index with approximately 3,400 constituents and an average duration of 6.8 years.  The index is constructed using MSCI’s sustainability criteria including value-based, controversial sectors and fossil fuel exclusions, and ‘red flag’ ESG controversy exclusions.  A minimum MSCI ESG rating of BBB is required for issuer inclusion..

Lorraine Sereyjol-Garros, Global Head of Development for ETFs & Index Funds at BNPP AM said:

“We launched our first ESG fixed income ETF in 2019, and have continued to expand our range ever since as we seek to meet growing investor demand for systematic fixed income exposure based on an ESG approach.  These two new fossil-free funds offer investors additional asset allocation building blocks targeting low levels of tracking error relative to those of non-ESG benchmarks.”