In the recent period, several regulations related to sustainability, measurement and management of environmental risks have appeared in European regulations. These include, for example, the Taxonomy Regulation or the European Banking Authority’s (EBA) Guidelines on Lending Processes, which also address the integration of ESG factors into lending processes. However, these regulations are just the beginning of the rise of green finances, the EU is aiming to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, but further action is needed to reach this goal. In case of the financial sector, sustainability risks are also becoming more and more perceptible, the physical risks caused by weather events are becoming more visible in banks’ balance sheets, and the risk of switching business processes in the future is also growing. Beside all of that, the responsibility of key players in the financial sector to facilitate the green transition has increased. In the interim period before the completion of the EU regulatory toolbox, the Hungarian National Bank recognized the importance of ESG risks, so at the end of last year it issued a draft Green Recommendation, which, based on international “best practice”, allows the domestic banking sector to be prepared to wait for coercive measures. Based on the longer social consensus, the recently issued final recommendation has been modified on several points
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