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At the conclusion of its 2024 Annual Meeting in Milan, the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV) has put out a joint statement calling on the financial industry to stop financing the production and trade of weapons and arms and condemning any type of violence, fighting, or war, from a humanitarian view.
The Global Alliance for Banking on Values is a network of independent banks - with over USD 200 billion of combined assets under management - that use finance to deliver sustainable economic, social and environmental development. As part of its ‘values based approach’ the movement has chosen not to finance the production or trade in arms, thereby cutting off a large avenue of funding for the companies producing nuclear weapons. Now, the GABV is calling on the rest of the financial industry to follow its lead.
The third day of the GABV’s Annual Meeting, provided participants with a deeper insight into @bancaetica's clients through learning journeys and the day concluded with the release of the GABV Milan Declaration: A Statement for Peace. #FinanceForPeace https://t.co/GezFSMwDXe pic.twitter.com/t4Dgm36vCR
— Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV) (@bankingonvalues) February 28, 2024
In the Milan Declaration, the GABV highlights the central role that the financial sector plays in arms trade and production, and thereby in all of its consequences. It also "calls on the financial industry to stop financing the production and trade of weapons and arms, encourages institutions to introduce or expand existing policies that curb finance for weapons and the arms industry, asks that they disclose these transparently, and invites institutions to join the GABV and express support for this Statement".
Susi Snyder, keynote speaker at the annual meeting and Programme Coordinator at ICAN, welcomed the statement: “This powerful statement reinforces what we’re seeing around the world, and particularly for nuclear weapons: financial institutions recognising that the negative outcomes of their investments in weapons on people and planet mean that the investment simply is not worth the risk. For the nuclear weapons industry in particular, this statement reaffirms the trend of financial institutions excluding these controversial weapons of mass destruction since the entry into force of the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW.)”
Representatives of the financial community attended the second meeting of states parties to the TPNW last year to deliver a joint statement encouraging states to work with the financial community to further strengthen the norms and objectives of the treaty, including by ending financing relationships with the nuclear arms industry.