Finance Watch

Flawed economic models mean climate crisis could crash global economy, experts warn States and financial bodies using modelling that ignores shocks from extreme weather and climate tipping points

🌍📉 Ignoring extreme weather and tipping points could make the climate crisis crash the global economy. Yet, current economic models continue to dangerously underestimate climate risk.

We can’t bail out the Earth like we did banks! It’s time for models & policy that reflect reality.

Economic models ‘fundamentally inadequate’ at showing climate risk, report warns Regulators called on to make managing climate risk an explicit part of fiduciary duty Economic models used as the basis of financial decision-making by governments and institutional investors are inac...

🌍🔥 Economic models are failing to capture #ClimateRisk; yet governments are still using them to set policy.

It is essential that policymakers include cascading climate impacts and tipping points in order to protect our economy and society from the worst impacts.

Your data could feed AI models in finance and beyond, shaping things like credit scores and insurance pricing, and exposing you to algorithmic bias and other harmful business practices.

#GDPR protections are being diluted for AI.

Europe is updating its digital rulebook with #Omnibus II. It’s meant to simplify and align rules for online platforms, AI, and digital finance. But in doing so, it threatens to weaken safeguards for your data, privacy, and financial rights.

Macron meme

Is advocacy exhausting and painstaking? For sure.

Is protecting people from financial harm optional? No ❤️‍🔥

More about how we support citizens 👉 bit.ly/4k2vSS5

Isabelle Buscke

Isabelle warns that decision-makers have lost sight of the root causes of the last financial crisis, which strained public budgets, hurt families & eroded trust.

“I witnessed the impact of the last financial crisis on consumers first-hand and how financial rules shape people’s lives." 2/2

Isabelle Buscke at the Finance for Society Forum 2025

Isabelle Buscke talking to Benoit Lallemand, the outgoing Secretary General of Finance Watch

Thrilled to welcome our new Secretary General @ibuscke.bsky.social !

Looking ahead, she highlights Europe’s challenges stemming from an economic model prioritising profit over people & society and notes:

"Europe faces a choice about the kind of financial system it wants." 1/2

Political cartoon showing a chainsaw labeled ‘Simplifier’ cutting through a stack of papers labeled ‘Vital social and environmental protections.’ The chainsaw bears EU symbols and is powered by a red fuel can labeled ‘Corporate lobbying.’ Above, text reads: ‘Commission unveils new tools in so-called “simplification” plans.’ Cartoon by @cartoonRalph

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The 🇪🇺 Commission is taking a political chainsaw to hard won social, environmental, and digital protections.

We need #RulestoProtect not #Deregulation.

Check out our new cartoons below by @cartoonralph.bsky.social and spread the word!

🏛️ Finance Watch at the German Bundestag

At a hearing on EU banking rules, Julia Symon heard the usual lobby claims. But this doesn't match the facts.

Well-capitalised banks lend more 📊.

No stability vs competitiveness trade-off.
It’s profits vs resilience.

#CRD #FinancialStability #EUFinance

#2025InReview
2025 brought major shifts in Europe’s financial regulations, raising questions about risk management and long-term resilience, fairness, and accountability.

🎥 Discover the topics that shaped Finance Watch’s research and public engagement. ▶️

📢 We’re hiring a Grants Administration Intern in Brussels!

🌍 Want to help finance serve society and the planet? Join Finance Watch and support our Operations & Projects team.

👉 Learn more & apply 💼: www.finance-watch.org/job/job-offe...

Bien dit @chrisaltereco.bsky.social :
"Tout pointe une montée des risques, dans beaucoup de marchés, fortement interconnectés, et impliquant les banques, mais surtout ne demandons pas à ces dernières d’efforts supplémentaires pour nous protéger des folies de la finance"

Lire aussi :

❄️ This holiday season, we’re sharing a glimpse of the future we’re working towards: a world where finance serves both society and the planet.

From everyone at Finance Watch, thank you for standing with us on this mission. We wish you a peaceful end to the year and a 2026 full of hope!

Report – Hidden risks in NBFI: Mapping vulnerabilities from shadow banking | Finance Watch 18 December 2025

A new Finance Watch report maps how this part of the financial system works and where hidden vulnerabilities lie.
🔗 Read the report: www.finance-watch.org/policy-porta...

As Christian Steifmueller puts it:
“The idea that the non-bank world can absorb unlimited risk is false. These can very well boomerang back into the core of the financial system.”

That works in calm markets. But when stress hits, the risks can spread quickly through funds, vehicles and banks.

Private equity, private credit, hedge funds and other non-bank actors often borrow heavily for short periods of time to boost returns.

NBFIs now manage nearly half of global financial assets — but, despite operating in a different regulatory environment, they do not operate independently from banks. They rely on banks for funding, deal structures and key connections across the system.

“Non bank finance” sounds like it sits outside the banking system.
It does not. Banks remain at the heart of today’s shadow banking system. 👇

Ever clicked “yes” online and later wondered why? You may have met a dark pattern, a manipulative design trick that hides fees, fakes urgency or pushes subscriptions. Dark patterns cost you money and compromise your privacy.

🔗 Learn how to protect yourself: www.finance-watch.org/blog/dark-pa...

@leevisaari.bsky.social from @ainowinstitute.bsky.social on the #AI bubble:

"Open AI lost 10bn in the last quarter. Three big tech companies spent 350bn on AI last year, and our EU competitiveness fund is 450bn over the next 6 years. This is a bubble which is going to burst."

#FinanceForSociety

Adriana Cuppuleri from @algorithmwatch.org addresses how AI influences credit scoring systems and the huge gap in agency regarding the technologies that have an effect on our lives:

"Scoring is never just neutral, it is built on a political assessment."

#AIAct #FinanceForSociety

🤖 AI is reshaping finance faster than regulation can keep up.

Adriana Cuppuleri from @algorithmwatch.org, @leevisaari.bsky.social from @ainowinstitute.bsky.social and Christian M. Stiefmüller discuss how Big Tech is reshaping our financial system (and society).

#FinanceForSociety

@annpettifor.bsky.social on the role of pension funds at the #FinanceForSociety Forum:

"Pensions should be invested in the domestic economy to provide for domestic growth, employment and income, from which the future pensions can be paid."

@annpettifor.bsky.social on the coming future crisis due to debt accumulation and the bailout state:

"The markets are operating in their stratosphere and beyond government oversight. Yet, unlike the crisis in the past, today the markets cannot and will not go bust..."

@annpettifor.bsky.social on the migration away from national boundaries - and democratic oversight and regulation - at the #FinanceForSociety Forum:

"The global economy is now effectively governed by those active in private global markets in money; not the democratic governments or the IMF."

@annpettifor.bsky.social at the #FinanceForSociety Forum:

"To the detriment of the rest of us and while the casino operates in another sphere altogether, it remains tethered to the real 'bailout economy' we live and work in: our pensions, cost-of-living, housing and our climate."

@annpettifor.bsky.social touches on the hype and marketing behind the #AI bubble at the #FinanceForSociety Forum:

"The AGI bubble may just be a vast techno-dystopian power play to put tech bosses at the helm of political and economic control. This is class war at its most brutal."

YouTube video by Finance Watch Finance for Society Forum | LIVE Keynote 2 with Ann Pettifor

📣 LIVE NOW! @annpettifor.bsky.social speaks along with Greg Ford from Finance Watch at the #FinanceforSociety Forum in Brussels on challenging the global casino by building economic and climate justice.

Watch here 👇

@andrewwatteu.bsky.social from @etui.bsky.social on the need for a bigger role for public finance:

"We need a bigger EU budget, common borrowing and safe assets, as well as a further reform of fiscal rules with the view of enabling public investment."

#FinanceForSociety