. co. uk / publications / pages / speeches / default. aspx of course, given the uncertainties around climate, not everyone will agree on the timing or the scale of adjustments required to achieve this goal. but the right information will allow optimists and pessimists, sceptics and evangelists, to back their convictions with their capital. the main obstacle standing in the way of a smooth and timely market - led adjustment has been the absence of quality information on climate - related financial risks and opportunities. as the task force has highlighted, a significant number of climate - disclosure regimes – indeed on some counts around 400 – already exist. but existing schemes vary in their status, coverage and ambition. for example, while 80 % of fortune 500 companies participate in one of the existing schemes, it remains the case that only around a third of the top 1, 000 us companies produce broadly comparable information on the climate - related financial risks they face. the task force ’ s report – presented to you today – shows the way forward. let me highlight some of its recommendations that will make a major contribution. the first breakthrough is a disclosure framework that it sufficiently comprehensive for use by all publicly - listed companies, whatever their sector, across the full set of climate - related financial risks they face. the recommendations are designed to leverage, rather than replace, existing disclosure regimes. so the task force has set out how firms can comply more effectively with existing disclosure obligations, by disclosing their climate - related financial risks and opportunities in their mainstream financial reports. in turn, this should ensure that consideration of climate - related financial risk, and opportunities, is properly embedded within, and subject to, firms ’ corporate governance and risk management. reporting on these risks cannot remain a niche activity. decision - useful, actionable information the disclosure recommendations deliver actionable information that will be useful in decision making. in particular, they focus on four areas critical to how real - world businesses operate : governance, strategy, risk management, and metrics. see oecd ( 2015 ), “ climate change disclosure in g20 countries ”. all speeches are available online at www. bankofengland. co. uk / publications / pages / speeches / default. aspx the expectation is that qualitative and narrative disclosures will be complemented with quantitative ones as is the case for other disclosures made in financial statements. these are grouped into the categories of revenues, expenditures, assets and liabilities and

system, and strong governance. asia ’ s simpler banking model, and reforms to strengthen bank risk management and risk - based supervision, help to foster a strong first line of defense. but as i mentioned earlier, we would risk false sense of security if we believe we can depend just on our simpler banking model. with economic and financial liberalization, especially propelled by the regional economic integration such as asean economic community or aec, that simpler banking model is changing. i will return to this issue later. for now, let me return to basel iii and the potential side - effects for asia? there are some concerns about unintended consequences from basel iii that bankers and regulators in asia have voiced to the standard setters. i will, at this time, not comment on those issues which are not concluded such as liquidity rule. one of the most important and immediate consequences would be impact on trade finance which is a critical issue for emerging economies and asia. this is because our economies and financial structure is more dependent on it, compared to some western economies. let me elaborate. international trade is a major driver of gdp as our export is part of the global and increasingly integrated regional supply chain. however, many of our exporters are smes not large conglomerate. these local smes rely on bank financing, as our financial system remains more bank - based than market - based. supplier of trade financing is still banks in western countries, especially european banks. the deleveraging of european banks can reduce the supply of trade financing and impact growth and development. to address this, it is important that basel committee recognizes that trade financing has relatively large impact on asia, compared to the western economies for which basel iii is mainly geared. treatment of trade financing in leverage ratio framework will create incentive for banks to shift away from trade financing towards other types of financial transactions, including derivatives which have lower impact on leverage ratio, but can earn higher return. this is because they are assigned lower credit conversion factor even though trade financing is less complex, more familiar, has low liquidity risk as they are self - liquidating, and most importantly, it clearly serves real sector. we believe these rationales argue for a more appropriate treatment of trade financing to ensure that the basel iii framework is appropriate for asia. the current effort of fsb to survey unintended consequences of reforms on emerging market is welcomed. bis central bankers ’ speeches before ending this note on basel iii, let me touch on thailand ’ s own take on these