ESG Still “In Favour” in ASEAN

Maybank’s ESG Still “In Favour” in ASEAN report examines ESG risk, market performance and sustainable finance trends across ASEAN-6 markets. Using Sustainalytics, Morningstar and other market data, it analyses low- and medium-ESG-risk companies, ESG-linked indices, sustainable fund flows, sustainability bonds and loans, and the development of voluntary and compliance carbon markets across Southeast Asia.

Maybank IBG Sustainability Research202221 Sept 2026

PublisherMaybank IBG Sustainability Research

Year2022

RegionAPAC

FormatPDF, 1.2 MB

2views

Key Takeaways

55.3% of Southeast Asians surveyed ranked climate change and extreme weather as ASEAN’s biggest challenge in 2025, the first time climate change ranked first at the aggregated ASEAN-10 level since the survey began in 2019.
68% of companies in the report’s ASEAN-6 Sustainalytics universe were rated negligible, low or medium ESG risk, while around 59% also met additional management-quality and controversy filters.
Maybank’s analysis found that ASEAN-6 companies with negligible, low or medium ESG risk outperformed the MSCI ASEAN benchmark by 9.4% over one year, 4.2% over three years and 8.6% over five years, based on data through January 2025.
54% of 208 ESG-linked global indices analysed outperformed their comparable benchmarks in 2024, compared with 48% in 2023 and 33% in 2022.
ASEAN-6 markets raised USD 19 billion in sustainability bonds and USD 44 billion in sustainability loans in 2024, up from USD 13 billion and USD 31 billion respectively in 2023.