This article is an edited extract from our April 2026 member newsletter, IFSWF Direct, published here for a wider audience. To receive future editions directly, subscribe here.
Hidden Currents: six years of IFSWF–OPSWF climate research
On 23 April, IFSWF published Hidden Currents, the sixth edition of our joint climate change survey with the One Planet Sovereign Wealth Fund Network (OPSWF). Reaching its sixth year is, in itself, a partnership story: six years ago, two networks with overlapping but distinct memberships decided to pool their questions and their members rather than run parallel exercises. The result is now one of the most consistent long-run records available of how sovereign wealth funds think about and act on climate change.
The 2025 wave, drawing on responses from 31 sovereign wealth funds, captures a genuine turning point. For the first time across five comparable waves, a majority of respondents cite improving long-term investment returns, rather than risk management, as their main reason for considering climate change (74%, up from 68% last year). Only 3% of funds now say they do not consider climate at all, down from 23% in 2022, and formal climate mandates have reached a record 29%. Climate, as the report puts it, has shifted from a compliance-and-reputational question to an investment question.
Beneath that headline lies a subtler story. Climate provisions in external manager agreements have climbed from 12% in 2022 to 42% in 2025. Engagement with portfolio companies, by contrast, has dropped sharply — from 59% to 36% in a single year — as funds concentrate governance within their direct control. ISSB-aligned reporting has more than doubled since 2022 (14% to 32%), while the share of funds that describe their climate approach in annual reports has fallen from 41% to 26%. Net-zero commitments have bifurcated, with both formal targets and outright rejection at record highs. Our members, in short, are reporting more systematically but less publicly, building internal rigour while stepping back from external noise.
The report is organised around five chapters, from motivation and the shift into the investment lifecycle, through risk analytics and capital flows, to reporting and target-setting.
For those attending the CRO Risk Forum on 25 June, we will explore the report and its findings on the day.
On Our Radar
SOFAZ, CIC and INA sign a trilateral partnership
The most important membership story this month is the launch of the Galaxy Orientis China–ASEAN Investment Platform, a sovereign-led private equity platform established by China Investment Corporation (CIC), Indonesia Investment Authority (INA) and the State Oil Fund of the Republic of Azerbaijan (SOFAZ). The programme had a first close of about $520 million and is targeting a final size of $1 billion.
For the Forum, the significance is that all three institutions are sovereign wealth funds, and both CIC and SOFAZ are members of the IFSWF Board, while INA is also an IFSWF member. The partnership, therefore, brings together three sovereign investors from different geographies and mandates into a jointly governed vehicle focused on long-term capital flows and industrial collaboration across the China–ASEAN corridor.
It also fits the broader pattern running through this issue: the most consequential work is happening through partnerships. This launch is another example of sovereign investors choosing to work together across borders to pursue shared opportunities.
What We're Reading and Watching
Norway on AI. Norway’s sovereign wealth fund’s CEO, Nicolai Tangen, on how Norges Bank Investment Management (which manages the Government Pension Fund Global) is using AI across its operations, a nice companion to the conversations now starting in our own initiative.
A new series: How We Work. Building on last month's audio experiment with Eline and Duncan, we're launching How We Work, a little behind-the-scenes series, in the same member-led spirit shaping the rest of our work. Enrico kicked it off with the story of how this newsletter itself has changed. More to come, do keep an eye out.
Looking ahead: IFSWF podcast launch. We are excited to share that the IFSWF Secretariat has been working on a new podcast series, bringing you candid conversations with sovereign wealth fund leaders, member practitioners, and key voices from across the ecosystem. The series will explore the themes shaping sovereign capital today, including evolving mandates and governance, geopolitics, technology, and collaboration. The first episode will drop soon. Watch this space.