Dear John,

When it comes to the economy, coronavirus and climate change have much in common. 

Systemic risks, like the current global health pandemic, can destabilize financial markets and lead to serious negative economic consequences for financial institutions, governments, businesses large and small, and most importantly, people. And, like COVID-19, climate change is a serious systemic risk. 

The wide-ranging physical impacts of the climate crisis — more severe floods and droughts, more extreme weather events, increased sea-level rise and biodiversity loss, to name just a few — threaten everything from our cities and towns to global food and water supplies. Just like this pandemic, the consequences of climate change is having an increasing effect throughout the entire economy.

Systemic risks demand systemic solutions. Which is why we are releasing our newest report, Addressing Climate as a Systemic Risk: A call to action for U.S. financial regulators.

This first report from our new center, the Ceres Accelerator for Sustainable Capital Markets, outlines how and why U.S. financial regulators need to recognize and act on climate change as a systemic risk. The report provides more than 50 recommendations for key financial regulators like the Federal Reserve Bank, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Financial Stability Oversight Council, insurance commissioners and more, to adopt.