April 08, 2021

TORONTO, ON — Today, 32% of Royal Bank of Canada shareholders supported a call for the company to boldly reduce financed emissions. The bank has funded more than $200 billion in fossil fuel projects since the Paris Agreement was signed.

VIEW THE RESOLUTION HERE: https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.sumofus.org/images/RBC-Shareholder-Proposal-2021.pdf

Filed by two SumOfUs members, who are Royal Bank of Canada shareholders, the resolution specifically called on Canada’s largest financier of fossil fuels, RBC, to create targets to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the bank’s lending and underwriting portfolios. 

“Shareholders have sent a clear message to RBC executives: if they are serious about tackling climate change, the bank must urgently set short and medium-term targets to reduce financed emissions.  Without these interim targets in place, RBC’s 2050 pledge isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.  Other banks are already going further and faster than RBC because they know fossil fuel investments are a bad bet, and now RBC’s own shareholders have reached the same conclusion” said Amelia Meister, Senior Campaigner at SumOfUs. 

The recent global Banking on Climate Chaos report found that RBC is the fifth largest funder of fossil fuels in the world.