ICE and risQ set to help municipal bond ecosystem better manage climate risk

Intercontinental Exchange (NYSE:ICE) and risQ, Inc., a Boston-based start-up focused on climate risk analytics, today announced a partnership aiming to help enable the municipal bond ecosystem to incorporate climate risk into project and investment decisions.

risQ has developed a comprehensive analytics platform combining climate science, catastrophe modeling and geospatial machine learning technology. The platform is capable of analyzing climate risk for all obligors and issuers of municipal bonds, delivering financially quantitative output across the key climate risks. The analytics are agile across all maturities, obligors and boundaries, from the largest counties and school districts, to the smallest utilities and development districts, and across the most complex hospital systems and transport authorities.

As part of the collaboration, risQ will exclusively provide ICE Data Services with its actionable climate data to connect to municipal security-level information, allowing analysis and comparison from specific securities to entire portfolios. This will be offered as an integrated service with ICE Data Services’ leading municipal pricing and reference data, offering a new tool to quantitatively measure climate risk in municipal bonds.

Mark Heckert, Chief Product Officer at ICE Data Services, explains:

“By applying geospatial climate data to specific municipalities and securities, risQ has created a ground-breaking data product that leverages our strengths in the fixed income markets. These new capabilities enable us to offer a unique product that helps market participants better manage climate risk as part of their overall investing and risk management processes.”

ICE Data Services and risQ aim to launch the municipal climate package by the end of the first quarter of 2020.