Asset owners are moving ahead of the investment managers they appoint in embedding responsible investment (RI) practices, according to new reporting data from the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI).
PRI’s 2025 reporting data suggests asset owners are integrating RI more deeply into governance, mandate design and manager selection, signalling a shift from policy commitments towards implementation.
The report, examining how asset owners are approaching RI, is the fourth in a PRI series analysing 2025 reporting data, following earlier reports on investor policy and commitments, human rights and social issues, and climate. It uses PRI signatory reporting indicators to assess how asset owners are putting RI into practice.
Speaking to IPE, Tom Attwooll, senior specialist, investment practices at PRI, said asset owners were moving responsible investment further into mainstream governance while paying greater attention to material sustainability-related risks and opportunities.
The report comes as asset owners face increasing pressure to demonstrate that RI commitments are translating into portfolio changes, amid tighter regulatory scrutiny of greenwashing and growing beneficiary expectations around transparency.
Increased scrutiny
Overall, the report found that asset owners are tightening oversight of external managers and becoming more assertive on sustainability issues.
Climate remains one of the clearest areas of divergence between asset owners and managers. Andrew Wells, interim lead product owner, MyPRI solutions and technology at PRI, said that, proportionately, “there’s a lot more asset owners doing certain activities on climate versus investment managers”, particularly around outcomes and frameworks.
PRI also found that nine in 10 asset owners now include RI-related clauses in contracts with external managers, representing a 10-percentage-point increase following a decline in 2024.
“We’ve seen sort of a general trend over the last few years, more increased scrutiny on different elements of responsible investment coming through, and more tangible and specific actions,” Attwooll said.
According to the report, 80% of both asset owners and investment managers identify sustainability outcomes, and 70% address them, with both groups adopting widely recognised frameworks. However, the reporting data identified several differences in how climate-related risks and opportunities are analysed and addressed.
Asset owners were more likely than investment managers to apply the Paris Agreement framework to identify sustainability outcomes (46% versus 29%), use climate scenario analysis (61% versus 36%), use or disclose climate-related metrics and variables (78% versus 65%), report progress towards climate-related commitments to clients or beneficiaries (68% versus 57%), and apply exclusions linked to climate commitments (46% versus 30%).
The report also highlighted weaker RI oversight in passive strategies, despite their significance in many asset owner portfolios.
Attwooll said RI activity in listed equity passive mandates had increased from last year, which was “encouraging”, while fixed income activity was either flat or down by one percentage point.
He cautioned that the data did not necessarily indicate passive mandates were a lower priority and said it would be “interesting to look into” how assessments by both managers and asset owners could increase.
