The rapid growth of the green bond industry is fanning suspicions that some debt is environmentally friendly in name only, encouraging investors to ignore the (green) label and focus on the credentials of the issuer instead. “We don’t buy a bond because it’s green, but because the company is,” said Tom Chinery of Aviva Investors.

Banks are putting pressure on giant oil-and-gas companies to accelerate their renewable strategies. Credit Suisse has partnered with the Climate Bonds Initiative to accelerate the energy transition. The duo has established a pathway for companies to issue “transition bonds” as a bridge between their current business and greener offerings in the future.

The EU has offered its first social bond. The offering was oversubscribed 14 times over. Orders blew past 233 billion euros. It gives new issuers significant incentive to offer their own sustainable debt, companies and sovereign entities. A 14-times-oversubscribed sustainable debt offering also indicates a market that’s structurally underserved.

In the first nine months, new money going into climate-aware funds totalled €37bn out of sustainable fund inflows of €134bn. However, climate change funds can be confusing. There is not yet a standard classification. Iberdrola or Enel are often held in climate change funds though still derive significant revenue from emission-generating activities.

Commission president Ursula von der Leyen announced that Brussels would use its new borrowing powers to issue €225bn of its €750bn recovery debt in the form of sustainable bonds. Right now, Brussels is working with loosely-defined metrics that state certain percentages of an investment as being green. Critics have said it is hardly robust.

Swiss bank UBS asked them to pay for Swiss franc cash deposits. Investors may feel they have no alternative for their cash than to invest in higher-risk assets in order to make some form of return. Gardiner at Rothschild is sceptical of gold and silver, though, because even after recent price increases neither has regained its 1980s price level in real terms.

Correlation between Bitcoin and the S&P 500 stock index remains positive, meaning that its price movements are consistent with those in equity markets. In addition, Bitcoin’s 14-day Relative Strength Index (RSI) is at 45, while the equity index’s is at 51. That suggests the cryptocurrency’s decline has been more severe than the overall stock market drop.

SEB AB expects to be the first to arrange a sustainability-linked bond in the Nordic region. The pipeline of deals would add supply to a market that has struggled to keep up with investor demand. Debt issuance for projects targeting climate neutrality now fall far short of the roughly €290 billion in investments needed annually, according to ECB estimates.

During the past decade, investors have increasingly sought out less liquid areas for returns that are isolated from swings in the value of publicly traded equities and bonds. Expect a bigger push into these so-called alternatives, given the worrying dynamic playing out between equity and bond markets during the current bout of risk aversion.

With stocks and government bonds at historically high valuations, savers are being forced to seek out alternatives. Investment strategists have suggested private equity, real estate, infrastructure, inflation-linked bonds and dividend-paying equities. Others have suggested that investors switch their exposure from sovereign debt to high-quality corporate bonds.

Denmark’s pension industry has long stood out as one of the world’s best. But in recent years, funds have responded to ultra-low interest rates by relying on risky, less liquid assets to squeeze out extra returns. Now, most offer market-based products, which give funds more investment flexibility, while pushing the risk of market swings on to savers.

German Treasury attracted more than €33bn of bids for up to €6bn of 10-year debt. Issuance of green bonds has exploded in recent years, as fund managers hunt for assets linked to ESG criteria. Germany’s plan to become carbon neutral by 2050 could cost as much as an extra 1.1 per cent to 2.8 per cent of gross domestic product a year.