ESG

The European Commission is once again adjusting the shape of the EU’s sustainability rulebook, this time turning its attention to the Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation. Published on 20 November 2025, the proposal aims to make sustainability disclosures far simpler, far shorter, and far easier for investors to understand. It is the clearest sign yet that Brussels is reassessing the administrative load of its sustainability agenda and looking for ways to bring consistency across a landscape that has grown unwieldy.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has put a temporary hold on California’s Climate-related Financial Risk Act, SB 261, granting an injunction that pauses enforcement while the law faces an ongoing legal challenge. The court’s brief, one-page order did not explain its reasoning, but it drew a clear line between the state’s two major climate disclosure laws. First, SB 261 is paused for now, and second, SB 253 will continue moving forward as planned.

Spain’s financial and audit regulators are trying to bring some stability to the sustainability reporting landscape as the clock ticks toward the 2025 reporting cycle. This week, the Comisión Nacional del Mercado de Valores (CNMV) and the Institute of Accounting and Auditing (ICAC) issued a joint statement outlining how Spanish companies should approach their disclosures while the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) is still in the process of being transposed into national law.

A coalition of companies, non-governmental organizations, and multi-stakeholder groups from the food, cocoa, coffee, palm oil, rubber and timber sectors is calling on the European Commission to proceed with the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) as scheduled. The group is reiterating its position that there should be no “stop-the-clock” mechanism, simplification review clause, or one-year delay to the regulation’s implementation.

California’s sweeping new climate-reporting requirements are headed to the U.S. Supreme Court, as some of the country’s most influential business groups push for an emergency halt before the rules take effect.

The European Parliament has taken a big step toward scaling back the EU’s corporate sustainability reporting and due diligence regime, voting on Thursday to streamline the rules and significantly narrow the number of companies that will need to comply.

The UK’s Financial Reporting Council (FRC) has issued a new sustainability assurance standard, International Standard on Sustainability Assurance (UK) 5000 or ISSA (UK) 5000, marking a significant milestone in the country’s push for more credible, high-quality sustainability reporting.