Tenth NRW.BANK.Green Bond placed / 500 million euros against climate change

NRW.BANK’s new Green Bond was placed with investors within a very short period of time. It is the first Green Bond issued by North Rhine-Westphalia’s promotional bank in 2021 and its tenth Green Bond in total. The NRW.BANK.Green Bond is used to refinance environmentally friendly projects in North Rhine-Westphalia such as renewable energies or clean transport. These projects comply with the EU taxonomy, while the Green Bond meets the strict EU Green Bond Standard (EU-GBS).

“Like its predecessors, our tenth Green Bond was extremely successful. This shows that we are meeting investors’ appetite – especially as we are one of the first issuers to use the EU Green Bond Standard as a basis,” says Michael Stölting, member of NRW.BANK’s Managing Board. “This way, we not only satisfy the growing demand for Green Bonds, but also support the state of North Rhine-Westphalia in implementing its sustainability and climate strategy.”

The latest NRW.BANK.Green Bond focuses on renewable energy such as wind energy and photovoltaics, energy-efficient buildings, clean transport as well as the renaturation of the rivers Emscher and Lippe. The effectiveness of these investments is confirmed by the Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy, whose analysis was last published for the 2019 NRW.BANK.Green Bonds. These Green Bonds, which also had a volume of 500 million euros each, were used to refinance various environmental projects, mainly in the energy sector, and saved 260,000 tons of CO₂ equivalents per 1 million euros per year. The analysis for the NRW.BANK.Green Bond issued in 2020 will be published in June 2021.

Most of the investors in the current bond come from Germany, the Netherlands and France and over 50 percent have a focus on sustainability. The issue was lead managed by DZ Bank and Toronto-Dominion Bank. The bond is listed in Düsseldorf and on the Green Exchange of the Luxembourg Stock Exchange under ISIN: DE000NWB0AL1. The minimum denomination is 1,000 euros.

With sustainability principles in mind, NRW.BANK has issued its own Green Bonds since 2013 and additionally started issuing Social Bonds last year. In addition, the Bank invests in a separate Sustainable Investment Portfolio to supplement its capital investment portfolio with proven sustainable investments. The Bank’s green funding curve offers funding recipients the opportunity to finance projects that are in line with the EU taxonomy for sustainable investments at particularly favourable conditions. This green curve has been laid down in the revised Sustainability Guidelines, as has the Bank’s aim to align the capital market business with the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) signed by NRW.BANK in December 2020. The PRI membership is a further contribution to the integrated sustainable orientation of the Bank’s capital market business.

For more information on the NRW.BANK.Green Bond, visit https://www.nrwbank.com/en/investor-relations/Issuance_NRW.BANK.Green_Bond.html. To learn more about sustainability at NRW.BANK, see https://www.nrwbank.com/en/about-us/sustainability/index.html.

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About NRW.BANK
NRW.BANK is the promotional bank of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW). Its mission is to support its owner – the state of North Rhine-Westphalia – in the completion of its structural and economic policy tasks. In its three promotional fields “Economy”, “Housing” and “Infrastructure/Municipalities”, NRW.BANK uses a wide range of promotion tools – from low-interest promotion loans to equity financing to advisory services. It cooperates with all banks and savings banks based in NRW on a competition-neutral basis. NRW.BANK takes into account the existing offers by the Federal Government, the North Rhine-Westphalian government and the European Union in the arrangement of its promotion.

Contact
Caroline Gesatzki
Press Officer
Tel.: + 49 211 91741-1847
Mobile: + 49 151 15179261
caroline.gesatzki@nrwbank.de