iShares extends its commitment to investor progress with the introduction of iShares Global Green Bond ETF (BGRN) to help investors pursue a measurable environmental impact from their investments. BGRN offers exposure to hundreds of investment grade green bonds whose proceeds are applied toward projects with environmental benefits.

"This fund simplifies access to green bonds, enabling investors to more precisely match their values to their investment portfolios," said Carolyn Weinberg, iShares Global Head of Product at BlackRock. "Issuers of green bonds disclose how their projects are achieving the promised environmental outcome, which will allow us to provide our clients with fund level impact reporting. BGRN can be positioned in the core of a global bond allocation or as a satellite in a diversified fixed income portfolio to achieve greater environmental impact."

Green bonds are issued to fund projects or activities that have a positive impact on the environment. Supranational organizations, banks, corporations and governments have increasingly recognized green bonds as an essential tool to finance climate-related and other environmental projects. To date, more than $500 billion in green bonds have been issued globally1.

BGRN sets a new precedent for green bond ETFs. It's the lowest-cost green bond ETF option in the U.S. at 25 bps, with a 5 bps waiver2. And it also seeks to track a US dollar-hedged underlying index, the Bloomberg Barclays MSCI Global Green Bond (USD Hedged) Index. The index hedges any foreign currency exposure back to the US dollar.

BlackRock is an industry leader and Executive Committee member of the Green Bond Principles that promote green bond market guidelines to support issuers in transitioning their business model towards greater environmental sustainability through specific projects. BlackRock is also a member of the Climate Bonds Initiative, an international, investor-focused not-for-profit focused on mobilizing the $100 trillion bond market for climate change solutions. The firm owns and manages more than $8 billion in green bonds allocated to different portfolios.

The Growth of Sustainable Investing

BGRN builds off iShares Sustainable Core ETFs as the latest effort from BlackRock to bring sustainable investing mainstream. Last month, iShares introduced its Sustainable Core range of ETFs, designed to offer low cost building blocks for investors to build broad, diversified sustainable portfolios.

In addition to sustainable ETFs, iShares has also introduced portfolio analysis tools, models and transparent data to improve the sustainable investment experience.

Demand for sustainable investing is expected to grow dramatically into the next decade as investors, specifically U.S. wealth investors and institutions, embrace sustainable ETFs as tools to align their investments with their values and long-term financial objectives.

According to BlackRock projections, sustainable ETF fund assets are expected to grow from $25 billion today to more than $400 billion by 2028. The rapid growth in sustainable ETFs could increase the ETF share of total sustainable assets (ETFs and Mutual Funds) from 3% today to 21% by 2028.

Bond ETFs Go Mainstream

iShares revolutionized the bond market with the launch of the first fixed income ETFs fifteen years ago, providing investors with liquid and transparent exposures to the bond market.

Today's green bond ETF is an extension of iShares innovation more than a decade ago, intended to provide clients with even more access to key markets where demand is growing.

Investor demand and comfort with using bond ETFs is further evidenced by record setting trading volume in October. Trading volumes reached $245bn of aggregate volumes, or $11.2 billion per day across all ETF providers. iShares bond ETFs represented 66% of total trading volumes for the month of October, averaging $7.8 billion per day. US iShares bond ETF trading volumes are up 29% YoY3.

BlackRock | www.blackrock.com

iShares | www.ishares.com