Morgan Stanley has quietly withdrawn its previous financing goal to combat plastic pollution. In its most recent ESG report, published on 5 September, the Wall Street bank no longer mentions its earlier pledge to help prevent, remove, or reduce 50 million tonnes of plastic waste by 2030. A webpage that once detailed the firm’s commitment to plastics now displays a “page not found” message.
A Morgan Stanley spokesperson confirmed that plastic waste remains a focus of the bank’s sustainability efforts, but the change in reporting is due to challenges with the “quality of data required to meet our disclosure standards.” The bank also announced that it will no longer track plastic waste-related financing as a separate target. Instead, Morgan Stanley will continue collaborating with clients and partners to finance solutions within the plastic value chain as part of its broader goal to mobilize US$1 trillion in sustainable finance by 2030.
The initial plastics target was set in April 2019, accompanied by advertisements at Morgan Stanley’s Times Square headquarters. However, Wall Street’s focus on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) strategies has since cooled amid rising interest rates, energy concerns, and contentious political debates in the US.
On September 20, 2021, Morgan Stanley highlighted its plastics pledge in a tweet during Climate Week.
When the bank released plastic targets, the then-CEO James Gorman had lauded the firm’s decision to be the first major bank to take such a step, while former Chief Sustainability Officer Audrey Choi noted that addressing the plastics crisis was a “very significant investment area.”
Morgan Stanley has been involved in notable financing efforts linked to plastic commitments, such as helping arrange a US$705 million green bond for Coca-Cola Femsa in 2020 and a US$1.25 billion bond for PepsiCo in 2022. By the end of 2022, the bank’s plastics policy had reportedly contributed to the prevention, removal, or reduction of nearly 14 million tonnes of plastic waste from the environment and landfills, as per a statement issued by the company last year.
Plastic pollution has reached global epidemic levels, with waste volumes doubling over the past two decades and minimal recycling efforts in place, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The United Nations Environment Programme estimates that 11 million tonnes of plastic waste enter lakes, rivers, and oceans annually—a figure expected to nearly triple by 2040. Efforts are underway to finalize a UN-backed, legally binding treaty on plastic pollution by the end of 2024, while some regions, like the European Union, have already enacted laws to reduce plastic use and enforce recycling measures.