U.K. Financial Firms Enable More Emissions Than Canada Produces

If the U.K. finance sector were a country, it would have a bigger carbon footprint than Canada, according to a report from Greenpeace and World Wildlife Fund.

The so-called financed emissions from British-headquartered banks and asset managers, as well as the U.K. arms of international banks such as Credit Suisse Group AG and JPMorgan Chase & Co., totaled 805 million tons of CO2 in 2019, almost double the nation’s annual carbon emissions, according to the report, published Tuesday. The analysis, which Greenpeace and WWF say is the first comprehensive account of emissions stemming from financial activity in the U.K., shows the CO2 emissions from the City of London to be greater than those from countries including Canada.