Throughout 2025, several leading banks demonstrated outstanding commitment to sustainable finance, with initiatives spanning green bonds, impact investing, and project financing.
The following banks are reshaping the future of finance with innovations that support long-term environmental, social, and governance goals, while strengthening their influence in both developed and emerging markets.
Societe Generale
World’s Best Bank for Sustainable Finance
Best Bank for Sustainable Infrastructure/Project Finance
French giant Societe Generale continued to scale its global sustainable-finance leadership in 2025, delivering strong momentum across several market segments, including a best-in-class year in sustainable infrastructure finance.
The bank’s continuous outperformance is supported by an ambitious €500 billion ($594 billion) global sustainable-finance contribution target for the period from 2024 to 2030, split between €400 billion in financing and €100 billion in sustainable bonds.
To achieve those goals, Societe Generale has made significant strides in its sustainability operations beyond the European market, where the bank historically dominates. In 2025, Societe Generale received a significant boost from its Americas operation, where it delivered year-to-date volumes of $44.9 billion in green, social, sustainable, and sustainability-linked loans as lead arranger, while nearly doubling its sustainability-coordinating activity to $14.5 billion.
Societe Generale delivered landmark transactions in sustainable infrastructure and project finance, demonstrating its strength in structuring and syndication.
In the US, the bank played a key role in supporting Project Miner, with an $18 billion green loan financing a 1.8-gigawatt greenfield data center, acting as coordinating lead arranger, appraisal coordinator, and active bookrunner.
In Europe, Societe Generale played multiple core roles in the financing—totaling just over €6.3 billion—for the Baltyk 2 and Baltyk 3 offshore wind projects in Poland. These will have a combined capacity of over 1.4 gigawatts, one of the country’s most important renewable-energy developments.
BBVA
Sustainable Finance Deal of the Year (Verdalia Infrastructure Financing in the Biomethane Sector)
Best Bank for Green Bonds
By leveraging BBVA’s unique position across developed and emerging markets, the Spanish giant secured several of the year’s most important sustainable-finance deals.
Among those was Verdalia Bioenergy’s €671 million corporate-funding package, the Sustainable Finance Deal of the Year, one of the largest infrastructure financing deals ever closed in the European biomethane sector. The multi-tranche financing will support Verdalia’s biomethane expansion across Spain and Italy, positioning renewable gas as a scalable decarbonization solution.
BBVA also delivered standout execution in the green bond market across different industries.
In October 2025, the bank supported the Public Investment Fund (Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund) on its euro-denominated dual-tranche bond, totaling over €1.6 billion and issued entirely in green format—the issuer’s first green euro bond.
Earlier in the year, BBVA acted as an active joint bookrunner for Chilean utility giant Colbun’s $500 million, 10-year green bond, achieving the lowest spread in the past 20 years for a Chilean corporate issuer. In Mexico, the bank helped deliver homebuilder Vinte’s 2.5 billion Mexican peso ($145 million) green bond debut in June 2025. It was upsized amid strong investor demand.
BancoEstado
Best Impact-Investing Solution
Based in Chile, BancoEstado integrates ESG criteria to generate long-term value while contributing to national climate change commitments, aiming to become the national-level green bank. The bank launched the Chile Ecológico mutual fund, one of Chile’s few green-impact funds.
Chile Ecológico invests in Chilean green and blue bonds, which finance the development of renewable energy, electromobility within Santiago’s RED public transportation system, photovoltaic-panel installations for renewable energy, reforestation, and water-sanitation improvements.
The fund raised 84 billion Chilean pesos from over 39,000 clients through October 2025. So far, it has already generated 80 MWh/year of renewable energy, saved 2.1 MWh of energy, reforested 4,355.8 hectares of land, and mitigated 47.3 tons of carbon emissions.
The fund was also the anchor investor in one of the first blue bonds launched in Chile.
CIBC Capital Markets
Best Platform/Technology Facilitating Sustainable Finance
Canadian CIBC Capital Markets has set itself the ambitious goal of raising $300 billion by 2030 through sustainable-finance activities and services, guided by CIBC’s Corporate Environmental Policy and Sustainability Issuance Framework, first unveiled in March 2024, earning this award.
This framework clearly outlines the eligible-activities category and defines it across 16 distinct areas, including clean energy (nuclear power is included here), clean fuels, pollution prevention and control, green buildings, biodiversity conservation, circularity, and affordable housing. This comprehensive platform has helped CIBC Capital Markets to raise $199.4 billion toward its 2030 target by the end of last year.
CIBC Capital Markets has also been quick to take advantage of the opportunities offered by AI, introducing several platforms to help staff identify and assess potential sustainable-finance projects. These have included the creation of an Enterprise AI Governance Office and the introduction of several generative-AI pilot programs, including the CIBC AI platform.
Scotiabank
Circular Economy Commitment
Best Bank for Sustainable Financing in Emerging Markets
Scotiabank is firmly committed to the circular economy, which should lie at the heart of sustainable finance—reusing, repurposing, and recycling buildings, products, and materials rather than disposing of them is fundamental to any sustainability strategy. In 2021, the bank joined the Circular Economy Leadership Canada forum to collaborate on reducing waste and boosting resource-use efficiency. The bank is active in financing projects such as waste management and recycling, as well as reusable plastic alternatives.
With many North American banks now shying away from sustainable finance, Scotiabank has more than redoubled its commitment, raising its previous ESG-finance goal of $100 billion by 2030 to $350 billion and offering the full range of ESG products.
Scotiabank has prioritized working with government bodies and international financial institutions, and finding business in emerging markets, making the bank our winner in this important global category. Among other activities, Scotiabank helped the Mexican government issue its first blue bond, for 4.5 billion Mexican pesos ($218 million) in December 2024, making funding available for sustainable fisheries and aquaculture investments.
In September 2025, Scotiabank served as structuring agent and joint bookrunner for the Mexican state-owned utility Comision Federal de Electricidad’s 15 billion Mexican peso triple-tranche sustainability-bond offering. The same month, the bank supported Parque Arauco, a leading Latin American shopping-mall builder and manager active in Chile, Colombia, and Peru, in its first-ever retail real estate green bond issuance.
CaixaBank
Best Bank for Sustaining Communities
Under CaixaBank’s flagship Sustainability Plan, which spans financial inclusion, access to essential banking services, and affordable housing, the bank mobilized more than €20 billion in sustainable finance in the first half of last year, a solid 28% year-over-year (YoY) increase.
A key driver of the bank’s highly focused growth was MicroBank, CaixaBank Group’s social bank and Europe’s leading microfinance institution, which translates the group’s community agenda into on-the-ground financing.
In the first half of 2025, MicroBank allocated nearly €1.2 billion to projects with positive social impact, while financing for low-income households reached 119,255 transactions totaling €798 million by June of last year.
CaixaBank also maintained proximity banking in 2,234 Spanish towns, including 460 where it is the only bank, operating 32 mobile branches serving 1,396 municipalities. Housing support included 9,110 homes in the bank’s social-rental program, with €186 million provided for public housing in the first half of the year.
Moreover, expanding its reach across markets, CaixaBank issued a €1 billion social bond in November 2025, backed by a €9.7 billion portfolio of eligible social assets.
Maybank
Best Bank for Sustainability Transparency
Maybank’s in-depth ESG coverage includes a host of frameworks and reports, all publicly and easily accessible. The bank’s regularly updated sustainability framework outlines its ESG mission, principles, governance, and goals.
A separate risk-management framework, revised in 2025, outlines the implementation and operationalization of ESG-related risk-management initiatives within the bank. Among other ESG objectives, the framework outlines a pathway toward Maybank’s transition to net-zero carbon-emissions financing goals; and it states the bank’s new policy for “No Deforestation, No New Peat, and No Exploitation.”
Also listed are the bank’s risk-acceptance criteria, defining sector-specific requirements for the evaluation, decision-making, and monitoring of clients and potential clients in high ESG-risk sectors.
An accompanying net-zero white paper lists targets for hard-to-abate sectors, including steel, aluminum, commercial real estate, and automotive manufacturing. Maybank’s transition-finance framework provides comprehensive guidance for credibly classifying transactions as “transition finance.”
BTG Pactual
Best Bank for Blue Bonds (New for 2026)
BTG Pactual has been integral to developing Brazil’s blue-finance market, having structured the nation’s first private-sector blue bond in 2022 and supported multiple issuances across the sanitation sector.
The bank has also been a key player of establishing blue finance instruments as a tool for water and sanitation projects in Brazil. The bank also contributed to this market by launching a syndicate loan desk in 2024 and structuring its ESG loan in 2025, a $480 million blue loan and a $118 million sustainable and blue debenture, the proceeds of which are being used by private sanitation company Aegea to support sustainable water use, environmental preservation, and the recovery of water resources and marine ecosystems. This transaction has a five-year structure and diversifies the company’s funding sources.
While this financing was among the first for a private Brazilian sanitation company, the scalable model can be applied to future transactions.
DBS
Best Bank for Social Bonds
DBS is fast becoming a major player in the Asian social bond market. The bank served as both joint lead underwriter and sole ESG coordinator for Bank Rakyat Indonesia’s (BRI’s) nearly $300 million social bond offering in June.
This was the first social issuance bond by an Indonesian bank. In DBS’ capacity as ESG coordinator for that bond, it supported and advised BRI in pre-issuance bond review, legal documentation, and post-issuance review.
Half of the proceeds from the bond will finance Indonesian micro, small, and medium-size enterprises (MSMEs). This is an effort to support job creation and reduce unemployment in that country.
The remainder of the bond will fund Indonesian socioeconomic development and empowerment efforts. Key among these is financing for affordable-housing initiatives, an effort to expand housing possibilities for underserved populations.
A second financial product, a green loan for the construction of one of Singapore’s largest data centers (to be built by AirTrunk) will be used in part to support community programs in that nation.
The Bank of the Philippine Islands
Best Bank for Sustainability Bonds
The Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) has issued a host of sustainability bonds. The bank notes in its award application that these issuances reflect its commitment to “grow[ing] our expertise in sustainable finance by learning the latest regulations, global standards and best practices in managing a balance sheet built to grow our commitment to sustainability.”
Offerings align with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ sustainability bond standards and BPI’s own sustainability framework. Among sustainable bond issuances are BPI’s 40 billion Philippine peso ($690 million) “Supporting Inclusion, Nature, and Growth” bond, and its 33.7 billion peso “Sustainable, Environmental, and Equitable Development” bond.
Funds are used to finance or refinance eligible sustainable projects. Both bonds have social and green components. Social financing includes support for MSMEs, support for community resiliency following natural disasters and other events, and projects that meaningfully contribute to social well-being—notably reductions in inequality.
Green components range from developing of sustainable water and wastewater management programs to pollution prevention and control.
International Finance Corporation
Best Multilateral Institution for Sustainable Finance
With the global sustainability market facing significant setbacks due to policy rollbacks in the US and increased fragmentation across developing markets, multilateral institutions face the challenge of providing a vital lifeline to the continuity of several projects and long-term sustainability goals worldwide.
Against this backdrop, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) directed a record 45% of its own-account, long-term financing ($8.1 billion) to projects with climate co-benefits, while mobilizing an additional $16.4 billion in private investments. On the capital markets side, the institution raised $24.5 billion through 221 bond issues and tap offerings, including $1.3 billion in green bonds and $6 billion in social bonds.
Among the institution’s main achievements, it issued a landmark $2 billion global social bond—the largest in IFC’s history—to finance affordable infrastructure, small businesses worldwide, and gender-inclusive economic growth, generating an $11 billion order book.
The IFC also issued a 5 billion Hong Kong dollar ($640 million) social bond to support essential services across emerging markets, marking the first public Hong Kong-dollar-denominated social bond issued by a supranational.
ING
Best Bank for Transition/Sustainability-Linked Loans and Bonds
ING notched one of its best years on record in sustainable finance, combining solid performance in its home Western European market with significant growth in the Asia-Pacific region. In that region alone, the bank’s sustainable-finance volumes surged 74% YoY in the first three quarters of 2025. In Western Europe, Netherlands-based ING’s sustainable-finance volumes reached a massive €110 billion in the first nine months of 2025, a 29% YoY increase, with several sustainability-linked deals paving the way.
In Australia, ING served as the sole sustainability coordinator on a 1.3 billion Australian dollar ($920 million) sustainability-linked loan for property group Aliro, tied to solar installation, green lease adoption, and green building certifications.
Raiffeisen Bank International
Best Bank for ESG-Related Loans
The year 2025 was a strong one for Raiffeisen Bank International’s (RBI’s) ESG-related loans, which rose 14.9% year over year at the end of September 2025 to €19.3 billion.
What gives RBI the edge is its genuine commitment to ESG (its target is a climate-neutral economy by 2050); the bank’s wide expertise across Central and Eastern Europe, where it is present in 11 countries outside its Austrian base; and a continuing capacity for innovation.
Last year, for example, RBI launched its “ESG Data Solution,” a new ESG platform and database that provides clients with information on 13,000 companies across 180 countries.
The bank currently offers a wide range of ESG loans, including retail loans, SME financing, and green loans for specific sustainable projects such as renewable energy and energy-saving equipment.
Using its extensive database, RBI works closely with clients to identify the most appropriate loan products for their needs and resources and to adhere to best market practice.