Nick Robins has over 20 years experience in the policy, research and financial dimensions of sustainable development. He was formerly the Head of HSBC’s Climate Change Centre of Excellence in London, where his research included annual reports on the bonds and climate change arena, evaluation of the potential risks of stranded assets from carbon constraints, an estimate of the growth prospects of the global low-carbon economy and an analysis of international ‘green stimulus’ programmes. The Thomson Extel awards for European investment research ranked Nick as the top analyst for integrated climate change in 2009, 2011, 2012 and 2013.
Before joining HSBC, Nick was first head of SRI research, and then head of SRI funds (UKP1bn+) at Henderson Global Investors where he produced the first carbon audit of an investment fund and helped launch the Industries of the Future portfolio. Prior to Henderson, he was Director of Sustainable Markets at the International Institute of Environment and Development, where he authored research on sustainable business, trade and consumption. He also worked at the European Commission’s Environment Directorate and was part of the original Business Council for Sustainable Development working on the Changing Course book for the 1992 Earth Summit.
Nick has authored and edited a broad spectrum of books and reports on sustainable development and corporate accountability, from his 1990 volume Managing the Environment: the Greening of European Business (translated as L’imperatif ecologique, Calmann-Levy, 1992), through his 2006 history, The Corporation that Changed the World: How the East India Company Shaped the Modern Multinational (translated as A Corporação que Mudou o Mundo, Bertrand Brasil, 2011) to his 2008 Sustainable Investing: the Art of Long-Term Performance (co-edited with Cary Krosinsky).
Externally, Nick is a member of a number of advisory committees including GE’s Citizenship advisory panel, the Climate Bonds Initiative, the Carbon Tracker Initiative and WHEB Asset Management.
