4  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/speeches  4  And the TCFD is here to stay through the power of market uptake - with 250 major companies representing $ trillion of market capitalisation and financial institutions (banks, insurers and asset managers) responsible for $ of assets already having committed to make these disclosures and to talk to the users of information about how to sharpen and refine what disclosures are provided. Green Finance It’s perhaps less obvious that I, as a regulator and central banker, but wholly understandable that many of you here in the room, might be focused on the opportunities as well as the risks from climate change – and specifically the opportunity to ‘mainstream’ Green Finance. Unfortunately, measuring and tracking green financing comprehensively is difficult, partly due to the lack of criteria, indicators and a clear taxonomy, and so an absence of proper green labelling. But we can accurately measure the labelled green bond market. This has continued to develop rapidly: issuance reached over $ in 2017, and is forecast by some to pass $ this year overall. There have also been significant innovations in recent years. For example, the Agricultural Bank of China issued a green RMB bond and Bank of China issued the first ever green covered bond in 2016. We have also seen an increase in sovereign green bond issuance including from Poland, France and Nigeria. 4  But whilst welcome, this is not enough.
The weakness of bank lending over the recent past has motivated much discussion on the reasons behind this and on the best policies to deal with the situation. In order to define these best policy measures, it is important first to fully understand the behaviour of this phenomenon and to identify possible frictions in the credit market that may be hampering its recovery. With this in mind, I will next provide an overview of the main factors explaining recent credit developments in Spain: first, in the context of the crisis period, and then in the current recovery phase. I will conclude with some reflections on possible policy considerations. 2. The determinants of bank credit in Spain during the crisis  When analysing the factors behind the contraction of bank lending during the crisis it is useful to distinguish between demand and supply elements, even after discounting the practical difficulties in separating both components. 2.1. Demand-side factors  Starting with the demand side, several factors contributed to the sharp reduction in the demand for credit during the crisis. First, loan demand fell sharply as a result of the deterioration in economic conditions, which limited current and planned spending levels and, hence, the need for new credit. Second, the need of households and non-financial corporations to deleverage and rebuild a sounder financial position is another factor behind the pronounced slowdown in credit demand.