Tell us what's "green" if you want us to chip in, ECB urges EU

European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde urged the European Union on Thursday to decide which financial assets can be called "green" if it wants the ECB's help in its fight against climate change. Lagarde has called climate change "mission critical" for the ECB but she faces political and technical constraints to fitting that into the central bank's narrow remit of controlling inflation.

Her job was made even harder this week when the Coreper body of European Union states, grouping countries' permanent representatives to Brussels, rejected a set of rules governing which financial products can be called "green" and "sustainable". The rules, known in Brussels as a "taxonomy", could have guided the ECB in steering its 2.6 trillion euro asset-purchase programme and its lending schemes towards sustainable assets.

"Unfortunately the Coreper has not found an agreement yet on taxonomy, which would be extremely helpful for us," Lagarde told her first news conference as ECB President. "That's our call to them, to find an agreement." The topic will be part of a broader review of the ECB's strategy, which is due to start in January and end by the end of the year.

"In our strategic review, we will take up climate change... and see where and how we can participate in that particular endeavour," Lagarde said. The review will also include the central bank's inflation goal and how to achieve it.