Everything you need to know about the GRI sector standards for financial services

In spring 2025, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) launched a public consultation on three draft sector standards for the banking, capital markets, and insurance sectors. The final publication is expected in the second quarter of 2026. This article explores the benefits of using these standards for your ESG reporting and outlines the main disclosure requirements.

The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) is an independent international organisation founded in 1997 that developed a global framework for sustainability (ESG) reporting. Its purpose is to help private and public organisations measure and communicate their ESG impacts in a way that is both transparent and comparable.

💡 Note : this set of standards is now one of the world’s most widely used references for structuring and ensuring the credibility of ESG reports.

The GRI has developed three types of standards, structured in a modular way so that all organisations, regardless of size or sector, can use them:

• Universal standards (GRI Universal Standards)

These must be applied by any organisation using GRI standards for ESG reporting. They cover the basics of reporting under GRI (GRI 1), general disclosures about the organisation (GRI 2), and the identification of significant impacts through a materiality assessment (GRI 3)

• Topic standards (GRI Topic Standards)

These focus on specific issues (e.g. economy, environment, social matters). Organisations only apply the topic standards relevant to their material impacts

💡 Note : an issue is considered material if it is significant due to its impacts on people, the environment, or the economy, and if it also affects stakeholders (employees, clients, investors, etc.).

• Sector standards (GRI Sector Standards)

These are designed for sectors where ESG issues are particularly significant. They provide organisations in those sectors with a list of the most likely material topics and the related disclosure requirements.

🔎 Focus : GRI aims to develop sector standards for 40 industries. To date, four have been published for oil & gas (GRI 11), coal (GRI 12), agriculture, aquaculture and fishing (GRI 13), and mining (GRI 14).

Financial services act as catalysts for economic activity across all sectors. They support growth by providing credit, investment, insurance, and payment services.

As intermediaries with significant influence over their clients, financial institutions are uniquely positioned to encourage sectors and companies - especially those facing major ESG challenges- to manage their impacts on the economy, environment, and society.

On one hand, they can mitigate negative impacts by encouraging institutional clients and investee companies to adopt more responsible practices. On the other, they can voluntarily direct capital towards activities that generate positive impacts.

Against this backdrop, the GRI sector standards aim to provide financial services organisations with a structured roadmap to identify, manage, and report on their sector’s most significant ESG impacts. In practice, they represent the first attempt at a comprehensive framework to evaluate the ESG footprint of the financial services industry.

Three sector standards (for banking, capital markets, and insurance) are currently under development. During the public consultation held from 5 March to 31 May 2025, exposure drafts were released for each.

💡 Note: according to GRI’s latest updates, the final versions of these sector standards should be approved and published in Q2 2026.

These standards identify the most likely material topics for the three subsectors, together with associated disclosure requirements.

⚠️ Important : using a sector standard does not replace the organisation’s own materiality assessment required under GRI 3. The aim is to guide organisations by highlighting the most likely material topics in their sector, essentially acting as a compass to ensure that no key issue is overlooked

Not all “likely material” topics will apply to every organisation. However, if an organisation decides not to treat a listed topic as material, it must explain why.

🏦 Banking sector

The banking sector standard covers both direct impacts (from banks’ own operations) and indirect impacts (linked to financed, insured, or invested activities).

According to the Banking sector Standard – exposure draft (Banking Sector Standard - Exposure draft), the key likely material topics and disclosure requirements are:

Secteur des marchés de capitaux

This standard applies to organisations operating in capital markets, notably asset owners, asset managers, wealth managers, and investment advisors.

According to the Capital Markets Sector Standard – Exposure Draft (Capital Markets Sector Standard - Exposure Draft), the likely material topics and disclosure requirements include:

Insur

This standard applies to life and non-life insurers, reinsurers, and insurance intermediaries (agents and brokers).

It covers both direct impacts (operations, governance, client practices) and indirect impacts (covered risks, investments, coverage, and exclusion policies).

According to the Insurance Sector Standard - Exposure Draft (Insurance Sector Standard - Exposure Draft), the likely material topics and disclosure requirements include:

While awaiting the final versions, organisations can already prepare by gathering the information they will need to disclose in their reporting.

Here are the main steps to structure ESG reporting under the GRI sector standards for financial services:

Identify the organisation’s material issues through a materiality assessment

Banks, capital market players, and insurers must first identify their own material issues through an internal assessment under GRI 3, using stakeholder consultation, impact studies, risk analysis, etc.

Use the applicable sector standard

The sector standard helps verify that the impacts identified align with the issues listed for the sector. If some listed topics are not considered material, the organisation must explain why

Report using relevant topic and sector standards

For each material issue, the organisation must then apply the corresponding GRI Topic Standards to structure its reporting and disclosures

Example: For reporting GHG emissions, apply GRI 305

If no Topic Standard exists (as is currently the case for “ESG risk management in investments” in the insurance sector), the organisation should rely on the disclosure requirements set out in the relevant Sector Standard.

• GRI website
• Sector Program
• Sector Standards Project for Financial Services
• Exposure drafts : secteur bancaire
• Exposure drafts : marchés de capitaux
• Exposure drafts : assurance