Key points in a nutshell:
- Sustainable banking is an integral part of radicant's products and services.
- At radicant, banking includes all your digital banking activities such as day-to-day accounts, payments, debit cards, eBill, and Twint.
- We emphasise five core elements for sustainable banking at radicant: impactful use of deposits, card payments with a positive impact, motivation for a more sustainable lifestyle, sustainability in the bank’s operations, and sustainability communication.
- A portion of your deposits at radicant contribute to positive impact.
- Use our carbon tracker to monitor the estimated carbon footprint of your transactions and keep track of your climate impact.
- radicant incorporates sustainability into its operations and corporate culture and also embraces an open and transparent sustainability communication.
1. What's included in radicant's banking offering?
With radicant's banking package, you can handle all your banking digitally and on your mobile. It includes: a day-to-day account, payments, a virtual debit card (or a card made from recycled plastic), payment methods like ApplePay/GooglePay/Twint, eBill, and various sustainability features.
2. What does sustainable banking mean at radicant
To merely align a single service with sustainability isn't enough. There's a risk that all company activities and products might counteract the sustainability goals and even have a negative impact.
Thus, sustainability must be bundled as a comprehensive package that encompasses all areas. Sustainable banking at radicant consists of four core elements:
- impactful use of client deposits
- card payments with a positive impact
- motivation for a more sustainable lifestyle
- sustainability in the bank’s operations
- sustainability communication
3. Impactful use of deposits: The bank's impact matters
Where does a bank have its greatest impact? Fundamentally, it's in its balance sheet and how it uses your funds. Banks usually perform maturity transformation in their core business. This means they take short-term client deposits, pool them, and invest them in longer-term assets.
For instance, banks may issue loans and mortgages or invest the money in securities (funds, shares, bonds). Excess liquidity can also be passed on to another bank in the money market or returned to the central bank (the Swiss National Bank [SNB] in the case of Switzerland).
At radicant, we aim to invest a significant portion of our balance sheet in impact-oriented investments through appropriate liquidity management. As such, we don't provide direct loans to heavily polluting industries like coal or oil.
We instead invest a substantial part of the capital in our own SDG Impact Solutions Fund and technology infrastructure. An increasing share of our clients’ funds is also invested in green bonds, financing environmentally friendly projects. The remaining liquidity is held at the SNB.
4. Card payments with a positive impact
With your radicant debit card, you contribute to a greener future free of charge every time you make a purchase, because we use part of the fees to finance sustainable projects. It doesn't matter whether you pay online or in a shop or withdraw money from an ATM. We top up this fee so that for every CHF 100 you spend with your card, together we finance, for example, 1 m2 of mangrove forest.
5. Motivation for a more sustainable lifestyle: Join the sustainability journey!
The previous aspects focused on the bank's influence and financing of sustainable climate protection projects. But, you can also actively contribute to reshaping the economy and redirecting consumption and production.
You can determine the estimated carbon footprint of each of your transactions with our intuitive carbon tracker! This tool provides real-time transparency on the climate impact of your activities, right in your radicant app.
Moreover, we will support you in the future with helpful tips on how to reduce your carbon emissions, so that you can make a positive contribution to climate protection with your everyday decisions.
6. Sustainability in bank operations: Holistic consideration of sustainability
Ultimately, a sustainable bank also measures its own footprint in terms of environmental and social indicators, and present these achievements in a transparent manner in a sustainability report.
radicant commits to being a role model for sustainable business at all times. This is evident by the corporate purpose documented in our statutes, which is aligned with both profit generation and contributing to society and the environment.
Sustainability principles are firmly embedded in our directives. Sustainability is considered a central principle for our internal regulations concerning suppliers, procurement, and travel activities, aimed at efficient and responsible resource usage.
Moreover, sustainability is an integral part of our personnel management. Our job descriptions highlight sustainability aspects, and we’re developing a sustainability strategy for personnel management. Sustainability is integrated into annual discussions and objectives, and our internal code of conduct and corporate culture guidelines also refer to the sustainability strategy.
Gender equality, as well as diversity and inclusion are particularly important in this context. Employees, the management, and the board of directors undergo annual training on the latest developments in sustainability and relevant regulations as part of lifelong learning.
7. Sustainability communication: Communication as an essential lever for sustainability
Sustainability communication without tangible evidence of a sustainability strategy is known as "greenwashing." And the term for a sustainability strategy that is not communicated is "greenbleaching." This refers to the practice of fund managers investing in sustainable activities but not fully disclosing them to bypass regulatory requirements.
Moreover, communication itself has a significant influence, convincing and inspiring customers and other stakeholders to take further steps towards sustainability.
radicant is proactive and at the forefront of its sustainability strategy. Our goal is to raise awareness about sustainability challenges while presenting concrete solutions.
We not only aim to inspire and encourage but also to emphasise the business and investment value of these solutions. Companies designing their offerings according to the SDGs have an advantage, benefiting from the growing sustainability trend and its accompanying regulations.
radicant also informs through social media platforms such as LinkedIn and Instagram Our SDG experts play a crucial role here. They are deeply involved in the investment and product development process and specialise in specific SDGs and sustainability themes.
8. Conclusion: Sustainable banking at radicant
As Switzerland's first digital sustainable bank, radicant offers a comprehensive sustainable banking solution that comprises the following core elements:
- We ensure that client deposits flow into green bonds or our impact-oriented funds and aren’t passed on as credit to fossil industries.
- With your radicant debit card, you contribute to a greener future.
- Our carbon tracker gives you an overview of the carbon emissions resulting from each transaction that you make and will soon offer tips on becoming part of the solution by adjusting your lifestyle.
- As a bank, we exemplify sustainability in our operations and corporate culture.
- Our SDG experts proactively communicate with clients and the community.
This sustainable banking package continues to evolve, to continuously enhance your banking experience.
In addition to our banking solution, you can start truly sustainable investing with as little as CHF 1,000, making a positive contribution to a better future. Our rating system provides maximum transparency, showing you which companies are held in your portfolio and why.
Furthermore, our portfolio managers ensure that your money is invested sustainably, diversely, and successfully.
Ready to start with truly sustainable investing and banking? Open your radicant account in less than 5 minutes – digitally, easily, and without paperwork.
