After half a decade of bringing holiday joy and toys to students across the country, the BBVA Compass Foundation’s Project Blue Elf campaign has shifted its focus to surprise and delight families that participate in the bank’s financial education programs.

Rolando Arellano Cueva is a renowned market expert specialising in developing countries, and is a member of the Advisory Board of the BBVA Centro para la Educación y Capacidades Financieras [Centre for Financial Resources and Education]. Throughout his lengthy career he has studied people’s natural tendency to constantly acquire goods, the consumer markets of Latin America, and the role that financial entities play in assisting with savings.

BBVA Compass wraps up a four-month pilot program in December designed to provide financial education workshops through partnerships with local nonprofit organizations. Based on the success of the pilot program, the bank plans to execute a full program launch next year.

The Turkish Women Entrepreneurs Competition recently celebrated its 12th edition. During the ceremony, the first and only one of its kind, the names of the winners of the four award categories – Turkish Woman Entrepreneur of the Year, Turkish Woman Entrepreneur Who Made a Difference in Her Region, Most Promising Turkish Woman Entrepreneur and Turkish Woman Social Entrepreneur of the Year – were announced.

BBVA Momentum, the social enterprise accelerator program launched in Spain and Mexico in 2011, wrapped up its second year in the U.S. in November with 16 entrepreneur participants.

Promising yourself to save and end up throwing in the towel is a common thing so a little nudge from time to time is no bad thing. According to the report ‘Nudges for Financial Health: Global Evidence for Improved Product Design’ of Innovations For Poverty Action (IPA), the commitment mechanisms that financial institutions put in place to help their customers are an effective solution for achieving savings once and for all and improving financial health.

The European Investment Bank (EIB), together with the global data company YouGov, has published the first-of-its-kind citizens climate change survey revealing popular beliefs about climate change and its economic impact. The study, which involved 25,000 people in the European Union, the United States, and China, exposes the extent to which the general public is concerned about climate change and what it means to their bottomline.

BBVA joined ING, BNP Paribas, Société Générale and Standard Chartered in a joint commitment to adapt their lending portfolio to the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.  In an open letter to the global leaders and heads of state currently meeting at the 24th session of Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP24) in Katowice (Poland), these banks committed to finance and design financial services that are needed to support clients as they transition to a low carbon economy.

The Principles for Responsible Banking were announced in Paris on November 26. BBVA is one of the founding banks involved in this initiative, which forms a part of the United Nations Environmental Programme.