The world’s largest banks committed $906bn in financing to the fossil fuel industry last year, an “unfathomable” increase in investment locking in years more of coal, oil and gas production as the world continues to overheat, a new report has found.
The surge in new fossil fuel lending, up $64bn or nearly 8% on 2024, shows that the world’s largest 65 banks are making decisions incompatible with international agreements to restrain rising global temperatures, according to the coalition of environmental groups behind the new analysis.
JPMorgan Chase is again the world’s leading financier of fossil fuels, according to the annual Banking on Climate Chaos report, after pushing $58bn to the sector last year – up 13% from 2024.
Bank of America committed the second largest amount to fossil fuels last year, followed by Japanese banks MUFG and Mizuho Financial. Citigroup, another US bank, rounds out the top five, with Barclays, at number eight, the highest placed British bank.
From the original report:
-Over a third of the world’s largest banks (26 of 65) reduced their fossil financing from the previous year, with some European banks and some Canadian banks driving most of that progress.
-The remaining 39 banks moved in the opposite direction, and some US, Japanese, and Chinese banks were responsible for the largest year-on-year increases.
-On balance, the world’s 65 largest banks committed $906 billion to companies conducting business in fossil fuels in 2025, up $64 billion or 7.6% from 2024.
-Since 2021, global banks have funneled over $4.2 trillion in financing to fossil fuels, including $2.1 trillion to fossil firms in expansion.
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Dealmakers and Dealtakers: Top Bank Financing by Country 2025
The US dominates as a financial center providing bank financing for fossil fuels. This petrostate also jumps off the chart (below) as the nation receiving the most fossil fuel debt from banks. In fact, US fossil fuel corporations received 45.4% of all fossil fuel financing in 2025. Comparing countries’ total bank fossil financing to their fossil fuel company borrowers, the US is an outlier. It is the only Big Six financial center [comprising the U.S., Canada, Japan, EU, China, UK] whose fossil firms receive more bank financing than its banks provide. Japanese banks, on the other hand, provide much more financing than the country’s fossil sector receives. In China, the volume of bank financing to fossil firms is about equal to the amount received by fossil firms. This is at least partly explained by China’s more insular financing model: about 86% of 2025 fossil financing from Chinese banks went to Chinese comp
Cool, not like there’s a mass extinction happening currently and possibly a full biosphere collapse. This is the second time an organism has caused a mass extinction but the first time it self proclaimed it was intelligent.