Intercontinental Exchange, Inc. (NYSE: ICE), a leading global provider of data, technology and market infrastructure, today announced that its Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Reference Data coverage now includes 2 million fixed income instruments. ICE’s ESG Reference data covers equity and fixed income securities across North America, Europe and Asia and adds transparency to allow users to better understand ESG risks and opportunities.
With the rise of sustainable investing, more and more investors have become focused on incorporating ESG data into their investment research and decision-making process. However, because of the complexity and size of fixed income markets, which the Institute of International Finance estimates are approximately three times the size of equity markets, many investors and other participants have not been able to view ESG metrics when it comes to identifying risks and potential growth opportunities in fixed income securities.
“ICE’s ESG reference data leverages the deep experience we have with fixed income instrument data and analytics and offers market participants a more complete view of ESG metrics,” said Anthony Belcher, Head of Sustainable Finance at ICE. “While much of ESG investing to date has been focused on equities, our offering allows users to assess risks and opportunities across multiple asset classes, all at the instrument level.”
ICE’s ESG Reference Data coverage includes corporate bonds, municipals, sovereigns and money markets across North America, Europe and Asia, and provides detailed ESG attributes and indicators that may be financially material, such as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reported, board diversity, benefits and many others, sourced from company and publicly available third-party sources. The data set can allow market participants to enhance their global equity and credit analysis by incorporating ESG-related metrics into their research and due diligence process, primarily sourced directly from corporate disclosures and other publicly available documents.
ICE’s ESG Reference Data is available in a user friendly, customizable dashboard, as well as via market standard feeds, that provides detailed access into the controversy metrics and ESG attributes about specific companies, securities and issuers. To learn more, please visit: https://www.theice.com/data-services/esg-data/esg-reference-data.
