Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC)
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The Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) is one of Canada’s oldest banks—2017 marked its 150th year in business. It is also one of the largest. Its four business units—personal banking, Canadian commercial banking and wealth management, American commercial banking and wealth management, and capital markets—control an asset base topping C$565 billion.9

Why the top 50?

CIBC is a leading Canadian enabler of the climate crisis, at a time when transitioning away from fossil fuel development is urgently needed. From 2016 to 2017, CIBC’s financing of the most environmentally extreme fossil fuels rose by C$2 billion.10

Key Stats

Head office: Toronto, Ontario

Revenue: C$16.3 billion 11

Employees: approximately 45,000 12

In Depth
Strategy

Like many large, service-centred corporations, CIBC emphasizes its ability to combat climate change internally through changes to its business practices. These changes began in 2002, with recognition that while the bank itself generates relatively low greenhouse gas emissions, “there are opportunities to further improve our carbon emission performance that is associated with our operations, supply chain, and business activities.”1 A variety of “green” initiatives have included reducing in-house carbon emissions and energy use, increasing environmentally conscious resource use, instituting recycling initiatives, improving waste management and reducing business travel by executives.2

Despite recognizing that “climate change is an important environmental issue” that will have a “measurable impact on communities and businesses all over the world,”3

most of the initiatives in CIBC’s Carbon Management Program assure that “business as usual” can continue. Measures in place to insulate the bank’s financial assets and ensure its future growth include

  • assessing the impact of climate change regulation on its credit portfolio,
  • tracking and assessing opportunities for carbon market investment,
  • developing screening tools for climate risk and credit risk assessment, and
  • assessing the physical impacts of climate change on its lending and investment portfolio.4

Like Canada’s other big banks, CIBC is a signatory of the Equator Principles, a framework for determining whether potential business activities (e.g., financing) impinge on the protection of natural habitats or Indigenous rights. Yet its grade from CDP (the Carbon Disclosure Projecta global disclosure program for corporations to track and measure their environment impact) is poor. CIBC received a D in 2018.

Company Name Country Ownership
Total (%)
MARKSMEN ENERGY INC. CA 20.0
TRANSALTA CORPORATION CA 4.88
GIBSON ENERGY INC. CA 4.54
BONAVISTA ENERGY CORP. CA 3.41
PEMBINA PIPELINE CORP. CA 2.78
CRESCENT POINT ENERGY CORP. CA 2.70
ENBRIDGE ENERGY MANAGEMENT US 2.58
ARC RESOURCES LTD. CA 2.56
FORTIS INC. CA 2.49
PHX ENERGY SERVICES CORP. CA 2.41
CENOVUS ENERGY INC. CA 2.36
ENSIGN ENERGY SERVICES INC. CA 2.27
ENBRIDGE INC. CA 2.22
CANADIAN NATURAL RESOURCES LTD. CA 2.16
TECK RESOURCES LTD. CA 2.13

Includes CIBC’s 15 largest shareholdings in fossil fuel companies. Source: Orbis Database, February 2019.

Notable shareholdings include Canadian Natural Resources Limited (2.16 per cent of its shares), Teck (2.13) and Enbridge (2.22) — central firms in Canada’s natural gas, mining and pipeline industries, respectively. These investments do not appear to be influenced by climate concerns; for example, one of the bank’s largest energy holdings (4.88 per cent) is TransAlta, an Alberta-based firm that burns coal to generate electricity—a practice with harmful impacts on the environment and human health.6

The bank offers consumer banking clients the opportunity to directly invest in Canadian fossil fuels through its Energy Fund. Targeted toward investors with interests in high-risk, long-term investments in the energy sector, the fund offers access to a portfolio that holds shares in some of the country’s largest fossil fuel companies, including Suncor, Canadian Natural Resources, Enbridge and Shell Canada. Created in 1996, the fund is now valued at nearly C$60 million.7

Aside from owning and leveraging shares in Canadian extractive firms, CIBC is also heavily involved in the financing of large-scale industrial projects, like the Trans Mountain pipeline (see below). The scope of this activity can be captured by reviewing the bank’s loans to “extreme fossil fuels”—oil sands, liquefied natural gas, Arctic and deep-sea oil, and coal—which are most harmful to the climate. CIBC’s portfolio here exceeded C$3.8 billion in 2017 alone, and over C$8.7 billion since 2015.8 The vast majority of its extreme fuel investments for 2017—C$3.6 billion—were funnelled to the oil sands, earning CIBC recognition as the world’s fourth-largest financier of oil sands extraction.

Ownership

Shareholder Country Ownership
Share (%)
Toronto Dominion Bank (TD) CA 6.38
Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) CA 6.01
Bank of Montreal (BMO) CA 3.63
Bank of Nova Scotia (Scotiabank) CA 3.28
Self-owned via its funds 2.79
Vanguard Group Inc. US 2.65
Power Corporation of Canada CA 1.36
Franklin Resources Inc. US 1.33
Brightsphere Investment Group GB 1.31
Deutsche Bank AG DE 1.07

Included are all shareholdings of 1% and greater. Orbis database, June 2019.

Network Map

Learn more about Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce at LittleSis.org

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About the database

The intent of the Corporate Mapping Project database is to engage Canadians in a conversation about the role of the fossil fuel sector in our democracy, by “mapping” how power and influence play out in the oil, gas and coal industries of BC, Alberta and Saskatchewan.

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  1. “Environmental Performance,” CIBC, accessed April 10th, 2019 https://www.cibc.com/en/about-cibc/corporate-responsibility/environment/environmental-performance.html.
  2. “Environmental Performance,” CIBC.
  3. “Environmental Performance,” CIBC.
  4. “Environmental Performance.” CIBC.
  5. Notable shareholdings include Canadian Natural Resources Limited (2.16 per cent of its shares), Teck (2.13) and Enbridge (2.22) — central firms in Canada’s natural gas, mining and pipeline industries, respectively. These investments do not appear to be influenced by climate concerns; for example, one of the bank’s largest energy holdings (4.88 per cent) is TransAlta, an Alberta-based firm that burns coal to generate electricity—a practice with harmful impacts on the environment and human health.5 Judith Lavoie, “Canada’s Physicians Want to See the End of Coal-Fired Power Plants,” The Narwhal, June 16, 2016, https://thenarwhal.ca/canada-physicians-want-see-end-coal-fired-power-plants.
  6. “CIBC Energy Fund,” CIBC, accessed April 10th, 2019,  https://www.cibc.com/en/personal-banking/investments/mutual-funds/growth-funds/energy-fund.html.
  7. Rainforest Action Network, Banking on Climate Change.
  8. CIBC, 2017 Annual Report, https://www.cibc.com/content/dam/about_cibc/investor_relations/pdfs/quarterly_results/2017/ar-17-en.pdf.
  9. Rainforest Action Network et al., Banking on Climate Change: Fossil Fuel Finance Report Card 2018, March 28, (2018), http://www.ran.org/wp-content/uploads/rainforestactionnetwork/pages/19540/attachments/original/1525099181/Banking_on_Climate_Change_2018_vWEB.pdf?1525099181.
  10. CIBC, 2017 Annual Report.
  11. CIBC, 2017 Annual Report.