World’s largest banks pledged $906bn to fossil fuel companies in ‘unfathomable’ increase in 2025, report finds

Climate activists protesting against Chase bank's support of Total Energies' East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) rally at JPMorgan Chase headquarters in Manhattan on 29 May 2026. Photograph: Gina M Randazzo/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock View image in fullscreen Climate activists protesting against Chase bank's support of Total Energies' East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) rally at JPMorgan Chase headquarters in Manhattan on 29 May 2026. Photograph: Gina M Randazzo/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock World’s largest banks pledged $906bn to fossil fuel companies in ‘unfathomable’ increase in 2025, report finds JPMorgan Chase leads 65 banks making decisions incompatible with restraining rising temperatures, researchers say 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. View image in fullscreen The Bank of America Tower in New York on 11 October 2025. Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images “Last year was the first year where we were hoping to see a continuous decrease in historical numbers, but we actually saw that increase and then that continues this year,” said Caleb Schwartz, a policy analyst at Rainforest Action Network, one of the groups behind the report. “So it’s a troubling trend.” Asked for comment about its fossil fuel lending, a JPMorgan Chase spokesperson said: “As one of the world’s largest financiers of energy, we support the full range of energy solutions and technologies, with a focus on reliability, affordability, security and long-term resilience. We believe our data reflects our activities more comprehensively and accurately than estimates by third parties.” In 2015, countries agreed in the Paris climate deal to strive to avert a breaching of 1.5C in global heating above preindustrial times, beyond which the world will suffer ever more ruinous heatwaves, floods, droughts and other climate-fueled disasters. View image in fullscreen The Enbridge terminal and pipelines next to the Suncor energy refinery on 23 August 2023 in Alberta, Canada. Photograph: NurPhoto/Getty Images Avoiding such a threshold would require the ne