OREANDA-NEWS. The Luxembourg Stock Exchange (LuxSE) celebrated an important milestone in its commitment to green finance, with the listing of the 100th green bond admitted on its markets on 18 February 2016.

An event to mark this achievement was held by LuxSE in the presence of Pierre Gramegna (Luxembourg’s Finance Minister), Dr. Werner Hoyer (President of the European Investment Bank) and Robert Scharfe (CEO of the Luxembourg Stock Exchange).

The issue (XS1107718279) was originated by the European Investment Bank (EIB) and brought EIB’s Climate Awareness Bond (CAB) 11/2026 to EUR 1.5bn, making the CAB the largest green bond in this part of the curve.

EIB has also previously issued two other green benchmarks in EUR (the EUR 1.5bn CAB due 11/2023 and the EUR 3bn CAB due 11/2019) which are currently the largest green bonds outstanding, and also listed at LuxSE.

In 2007 the EIB launched and listed on LuxSE the first ever green bond, kicking off the market. Both this pioneer listing and today’s latest listing highlight EIB’s early and systematic commitment to promote direct capital market engagement in the area of climate finance, as well as LuxSE’s commitment to accompany green issuers with the highest transparency, dedicated to this growing market segment. The EIB has led by example in providing a transparent and accountable green bond product.

The relevance of these commitments for the market was underlined by the event attendance of the underwriters of the two transactions: Bank of America, Commerzbank and Unicredit in 2007; Bank of America, Barclays, Commerzbank, HSBC and Natixis last week.

Today, with 100 green bonds listed in 20 currencies by 20 issuers, LuxSE is by far the leading exchange at international level.

Following the COP21 agreement, green bond issuance is expected to play an increasing role in green finance and stock exchanges can play a distinctive role for scaling-up the market promoting transparency, accountability and comparability while facilitating investor assessment and public confidence.

As a reputable stock exchange committed to sustainability, LuxSE is committed to the further growth of the green bond market and is determined to do all that is necessary to facilitate green fund raising and offer the highest transparency to investors.