Methodology Change | All Solactive owned & administered EU Climate Transition Benchmarks and EU Paris-aligned Benchmarks based on Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) data | Effective Date 05/01/2022

Today, on the 09/12/2021, Solactive announces the following changes to the methodology of all Solactive owned & administered EU Climate Transition Benchmarks and EU Paris-aligned Benchmarks (the ‘Affected Benchmarks’) managed in accordance with Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2020/1818 and based on data released by ISS (the ‘Data Provider’).

For a complete list of Solactive owned & administered Affected Benchmarks impacted by this consultation, please contact epd@solactive.com and fixedincome.pd@solactive.com.

Rationale for Methodology Change

Due to a significant change in the calculation methodology in Scope 3 emissions provided by the Data Provider, Solactive will change the Base Date/Base Day for the Affected Benchmarks.

The Data Provider will update their Scope 3 emission methodology starting with 2020 data that will be released in January 2022. The improvements in methodology encompass usage of reported Scope 3 data and enhanced Scope 3 data modelling. Previously, all Scope 3 emission data were modelled.

The changes of the Scope 3 data are assessed to be significant due to the significant adjustment of the methodology to define Scope 3 emissions and due to the extent of changes in Scope 3 emissions values. As the Affected Benchmarks follow the Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2020/1818, the proposed changes follow the methodology as described in Article 8 (2) of this regulation. Hence, a new Base Date/Base Day shall be set in order to account for the change in underlying data during the first regular selection of the respective indices in 2022.

Changes to the Index Guideline

The following Methodology changes will be implemented in the Index Guideline: 

For all Affected Benchmarks, the definition of the Base Date/Base Day, as defined in the respective guideline, shall be amended to the first Selection Day of the respective Index in 2022 and become effective in the course of the first selection of the respective Index in 2022.

Defined terms used in this announcement, but not defined herein, have the meaning assigned to them in the respective index guideline of the Affected Indices. The amended version of the index guideline will be available on the effective date.