JB Financial joins UN initiative of net zero banking

South Korea’s JB Financial Group said Tuesday it has joined a UN-convened alliance of global banks, committed to aligning their portfolios with net-zero emissions by 2050.

The holding group of regional Jeonbuk Bank and Kwangju Bank said its latest move to join the Net-Zero Banking Alliance was to uphold its environmental, sustainable and governance goals.

The alliance represents more than a third of global banking assets, with a total of 87 members from 36 countries, including investment banking giants Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, HSBC and Standard Chartered. Its members commit to align their lending and investment portfolios with net-zero values and set scenario-based interim targets for 2030 or sooner for priority sectors.

In line with its net zero banking membership, JB Financial plans to set an interim and long-term goals to cap average global temperature increase by 1.5 degrees Celsius, set goals based on scientific research and theories and regularize disclosure of information tied to its net-zero projects.

JB Financial, on top of it, has already joined the government task force on climate-related financial disclosures in a bid to establish a solid system for ESG management.

“By joining the net zero banking initiative and the government-led task force on financial disclosures, we plan to focus on transition to a future-oriented financial institution and our duty to achieve net-zero values,” a JB Financial official said.

JB Financial logged a third-quarter net profit of 134 billion won ($114 million) gaining 21.9 percent on-year. It posted a cumulative net profit of 412.4 billion won for the January-September period, hitting an all-time high of 38 percent on-year for the cited period.

By Jung Min-kyung (mkjung@heraldcorp.com)