The biggest banks in the world increased financing for fossil fuels by 8% in 2025 from a year earlier, committing a total of $906 billion to fossil fuel companies amid climate policy rollbacks, especially at U.S. and Japanese banks.
Since the Paris Agreement of 2015, the world’s 65 largest banks have financed oil, natural gas, and coal operations with a combined $8.7 trillion, showed the annual Banking on Climate Chaos report from campaigners coordinated by Rainforest Action Network.
Last year was the second consecutive year in which the biggest banks in the world raised financing for fossil fuel companies, after declines in 2022 and 2023 amid increased focus on ESG policies and climate commitments in the early part of the decade.
But following a backlash against net-zero policies, especially in the United States, banks raised fossil fuel funding to $869 billion in 2024, up by $162 billion from 2023, the 16th edition of the report showed last year.
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Now the 17th edition of the report, which uses open-source datasets, found that banks boosted funding for oil, gas, and coal for the second year in a row, with U.S. giants JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America leading the pack, ahead of Japan’s Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG).
JPMorgan Chase remains the world’s number-one fossil fuel financier, committing $58.2 billion in 2025 alone, a 12.5% increase from 2024, the latest report found.
Bank of America ranks second at $47 billion, and Japan’s Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG) was third at $47 billion, with a 21% increase in a single year.
The top ten of the banks lending the most to fossil fuel companies includes Japan’s Mizuho Financial and SMBC Group, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, and Morgan Stanley of the U.S., Royal Bank of Canada, and the UK’s Barclays.
US banks’ share of all global bank fossil fuel financing increased to 32% last year from 28% in 2021, and represents the single largest source of fossil capital in the world. By contrast, European banks have reduced their share of financing. But while BNP Paribas reduced fossil deals by 28%, UBS by 36%, and La Caixa by 34%, Standard Chartered increased its fossil fuel financing by 28%, Deutsche Bank by 20%, and HSBC by 16%.
“The scale of finance still flowing to fossil fuels — especially fossil fuel expansion — shows how deeply major banks remain tied to a climate-wrecking business model,” said Lucie Pinson, director and founder at Reclaim Finance and co-author of the report.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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