Request for proposals: Cash and money market funds

The Banking Engagement Forum, in collaboration with a research team at the University, has been working for some time on a suite of projects that seek to address the financing of fossil fuel expansion. Since the beginning of 2024 the Banking Engagement Forum has been overseeing an effort to catalyse a new market for cash products.

Cash and money markets funds RfP

UK Universities propose new cash market to stop financing fossil fuel expansion

Eighty-three leading institutions and trusts in UK Higher Education, including the Universities of Cambridge, Edinburgh, Leeds, Oxford, Southampton, St Andrews, Westminster, and University College London, have collaborated on a new effort to catalyse a market for cash products that do not contribute to the financing of fossil fuel expansion.

The institutions are especially keen to avoid financing companies that are constructing new coal- and gas-fired power plants in OECD countries. New fossil fuel infrastructure can lock in decades of fossil fuel demand and subsequent greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that are the main cause of climate change.

The institutions have issued a Request for Proposals (RfP) to financial institutions for cash products such as deposits and money market funds.

University of Cambridge Chief Financial Officer Anthony Odgers said:

“What we and our partners are focussed on with this mandate is finding financial services products that do not contribute to the expansion of fossil fuels – in particular, new coal- and gas-fired plants which lock in demand for decades.”

Responsible investment is a mainstream part of equities investing, but it is still not widespread in the debt markets even though a large majority of the new capital for companies constructing new fossil fuel power stations or exploring for new reserves comes from debt.

For this reason, the institutions behind the RfP have focused on banks and the bond market as the primary sources of external financing for fossil fuel expansion. Fossil fuels are responsible for over 75% of GHG emissions globally.

The RfP criteria are in line with emissions reductions laid out in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)’s Sixth Assessment Report.

University of Cambridge Head of Group Treasury Heather Davis said:

“The University treasurers in this group all share a common goal, which is to manage money in a way that doesn’t contribute to the financing of fossil fuel expansion and to find something that aligns with the IEA Net Zero Emissions Scenario, and that is lacking in the cash space at present.”

Results: Cash and money market funds RfP

Cash and Money Markets RfP: Banks and Building Societies List

Various deposit-taking financial institutions responded to the RfP. Drawing on the responses and, in several cases, multiple meetings with financial institutions that were close to meeting the objectives of the RfP, the project team assessed these institutions’ fossil fuel expansion financing.

To date, seven institutions have been deemed to have met the objectives of the RfP, in that they were found to have no clients in the fossil fuel or utilities sector that were a) building new fossil fuel infrastructure and/or b) exploring for new fossil fuel reserves:

Coventry Building Society
Handelsbanken
Leeds Building Society
Skipton Building Society
The Co-operative Bank
Unity Trust Bank
Yorkshire Building Society

See Press Release.

For further information, please contact us directly at BEF@admin.cam.ac.uk

Cash and Money Markets RfP: Quasi-Money Market Fund

The project team undertook extensive engagements to identify the most suitable asset manager to build a quasi-Money Market Fund in which the counterparties do not finance fossil fuel expansion.

The Quasi-MMF Working Group – comprising representatives from Jesus College, University of Cambridge; St Antony’s College, University of Oxford; University of Westminster; University of Bristol; University of Edinburgh; University of Oxford; University College London; and the University of Cambridge – selected Amundi as the fund manager.

The fund launch is planned for 2026.

Co-signatories to the RfP

Aberystwyth University
Bath Spa University
Birkbeck, University of London
Bournemouth University
Brasenose College, Oxford
Cambridge University Press & Assessment
Cardiff University
Christ’s College, Cambridge
Churchill College, Cambridge
Clare College, Cambridge
Clare Hall College, Cambridge
Corpus Christi College, Cambridge
Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Coventry University
Darwin College, Cambridge
Downing College, Cambridge
Emmanuel College, Cambridge
Essex College, Oxford
Falmouth University
Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge
Girton College, Cambridge
Glasgow Caledonian University
Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge
Homerton College, Cambridge
Hughes Hall, Cambridge
Jesus College, Cambridge
Jesus College, Oxford
JISC
King’s College, Cambridge
London School of Economics
Loughborough University
Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge
Magdalene College, Cambridge
Manchester Metropolitan University
Merton College, Oxford
Newcastle University
Newnham College, Cambridge
Northumbria University
Nottingham Trent University
Oxford Brookes University
Pembroke College, Cambridge
Peterhouse, Cambridge
Queens’ College, Cambridge
Robinson College, Cambridge
Royal Holloway University
Selwyn College, Cambridge
Sheffield Hallam University
Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge
St Antony’s College, Oxford
St Catharine’s College, Cambridge
St Edmund Hall, Oxford
St Edmund’s College, Cambridge
St John’s College, Cambridge
Swansea University
The Gates Cambridge Trust
The Isaac Newton Trust, Cambridge
The Open University
The Queen’s College, Oxford
Trinity College, Cambridge
University College London (UCL)
University of Bath
University of Bristol
University of Cambridge
University of Dundee
University of East London
University of Edinburgh
University of Exeter
University of Gloucestershire
University of Greenwich
University of Leeds
University of Liverpool
University of Manchester
University of Oxford
University of Plymouth
University of Reading
University of Southampton
University of St Andrews
University of Sussex
University of the Arts London
University of Westminster
University of York
Wolfson College, Cambridge
Worcester College, Oxford

More about the RfP

Download University of Cambridge Money Markets Fund Request for Proposals (181.68 KB)
Download RfP FAQs (138.44 KB)
Download Progress update from January 2025 on the Request for Proposals (142.32 KB)

For further information, please contact us directly at BEF@admin.cam.ac.uk

For media enquiries: Please contact Paul Casciato directly by email paul.casciato@admin.cam.ac.uk or by mobile at 07850070926.