Wall Street's Trillion-Dollar ESG Club Comes With Huge Tax Perks

摘要

Bank of America Corp. sparked a stir in January - and a little envy - with just a few lines of disclosure in its fourth-quarter earnings report. The lender revealed it had slashed its 2020 corporate tax rate to 5.8% from what would have been 21%, thanks to finance work involving environmental, social and governance projects. That didn't go unnoticed by Bank of America's competitors. Executives at one large regional bank saw it, and talked to Bryen Alperin, director of renewable energy for tax specialist Foss & Co. "Wow, look at that," the company told him, he said. "Maybe we should be doing this." In fact, pretty much everyone is. This month, JPMorgan Chase & Co. announced a pledge to finance and facilitate at least $2.5 trillion of sustainable and climate-friendly deals over the next decade, Bank of America set a target of $1.5 trillion, and Citigroup Inc. and Morgan Stanley said they would be mobilizing $1 trillion each. Meet Wall Street's new trillion-dollar ESG club. The banks created it, analysts say, to please regulators, impress shareholders and activists, do some good - and cut their tax bills.