2025 Mid-Year ESG Rating Results from Zhong Chengxin: Haier Smart Home AA, Midea AA-, Gree A+
ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) has become an essential standard for evaluating a company's comprehensive strength and sustainable development in the capital market.
Globally, well-known companies such as Apple, Microsoft, Shell, Unilever, Tesla, and Google are increasingly incorporating ESG into their corporate strategies.
Why do global giants place great emphasis on ESG? The essence lies in: ESG not only assesses a company's impact on the environment and society but also evaluates its governance structure whether healthy, operations whether sustainable, and becomes a key driver for boosting risk resistance capacity and ensuring long-term growth.
Recently, Zhong Chengxin released the mid-year ESG rating results for 2025, which has attracted industry attention and provided a reference basis for capital markets to select targets using ESG as an evaluation indicator.
Among them, Haier Smart Home received an AA rating, ranking first in the home appliance industry; Midea Group and Hisense Home Appliances tied with an AA- rating; Gree Electric and five other companies received A+ ratings. This result shows that Chinese home appliance companies are showing a differentiated trend in ESG practices.
ESG ratings are more likely to gain capital market favor
Based on the results of this year's Zhong Chengxin rating system, a total of 102 home appliance companies have been listed, with Haier Smart Home being the only company to receive an AA rating, Midea Group and Hisense Home Appliances tying for AA-, and Gree Electric and several other companies receiving A+ ratings.
ESG ratings are a concrete manifestation of corporate social responsibility
As the ESG concept continues to heat up in China's capital market, companies' sustainable development is becoming a core dimension for investors to evaluate long-term value.
By May 2025, among the over 5400 listed A-share companies in China, 2461 companies have disclosed ESG-related reports, with a disclosure rate exceeding 45%, setting a new high record.
ESG is not just a simple rating but a foundation for attracting capital, building brand reputation, and global competitiveness, representing the specific embodiment of corporate environmental management, social responsibility, and governance compliance.
From a global perspective, well-known investment institutions have already recognized ESG as an essential screening standard. ESG ratings high companies are often viewed as more resilient and having greater long-term growth potential.
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink has pointed out: "Climate risk is just investment risk; a company's ESG performance determines its future value creation ability."
ESG ratings are the path to the future
For home appliance companies going global, ESG cannot be mere formalism but rather a measuring stick for sustainable development and global competitiveness.
In China's home appliance industry, the three giants' ESG performances may have differences, but overall they are not bad. Haier Smart Home has made ESG a core strategy, integrating it into product, supply chain, labor, governance, and other aspects; Midea is accelerating its digital transformation; Gree Electric is in a key stage of upgrading from traditional advantages to systemic governance.
From a global perspective, ESG ratings high companies have an advantage in brand reputation, supply chain, customer relationships, etc. ESG is not just a social report card but becomes one of the keys for attracting global capital and winning capital market favor.
As Fortune magazine has said: "ESG is not a trend, but a company's path to the future."