S&P Global Adds Credit Risk to Tier 1 Cleantech Screen, Names JinkoSolar a Tier 1 Module Supplier
S&P Global's 2026 Tier 1 cleantech company list folds credit risk into its financial performance test for the first time, using the RiskGauge framework, a change from the criteria applied in 2025. JinkoSolar was named a Tier 1 photovoltaic module supplier under the revised screen.
The listing is JinkoSolar's second consecutive year of recognition, following the first edition of the ranking in 2025.
Six dimensions govern the assessment: market influence and cumulative shipments, manufacturing capacity, international footprint, financial soundness, and sustainability. Credit risk now sits inside the financial pillar rather than alongside it. That places lender-style scoring at the centre of a designation buyers and banks use to vet module counterparties.
JinkoSolar cleared the benchmark on all six dimensions and ranked first on two of them, cumulative shipments and sustainability, according to the company.
Cumulative global module shipments exceed 400 GW, and the company has taken the top spot in worldwide sales seven times. Its sales network covers close to 200 countries and regions, with stable shares held in Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and Southeast Asia.
On the technology side, JinkoSolar says it has set world records for cell efficiency and module power 33 times. Laboratory conversion efficiency for its perovskite tandem cell tops 34.82%.
The flagship product on the N-type TOPCon platform, the Tiger Neo 3.0 module, reaches a maximum output of 670 W, conversion efficiency above 24.8% and a bifaciality ratio of up to 90%.
The sustainability pillar draws on separate S&P Global work. In the most recent Corporate Sustainability Assessment (CSA), JinkoSolar scored 78 points and ranked first in the photovoltaic sector, earning a place in the 2026 Sustainability Yearbook. It also received the Top 1% in China distinction and describes itself as the first solar company selected in two consecutive years for both the global and the China editions of the yearbook.
The company published its first Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) report in 2025, converting what it had called a climate strategy map into a nature strategy map, and joined the UN Women Women's Empowerment Principles (WEPs) initiative. S&P rated its data transparency very high.
For module buyers outside China, the practical consequence of the RiskGauge addition is that a supplier's balance sheet fragility can now cost it the Tier 1 label even where shipment volumes and factory scale are ample. Procurement teams, project lenders and insurers routinely condition warranty assumptions on Tier 1 status, so a screen that reads credit quality directly narrows the set of names that clear diligence on paper.
The two dimensions where JinkoSolar placed first, cumulative shipments and sustainability, are also the two least sensitive to a single quarter of margin pressure. The 400 GW shipment base and the 78-point CSA score are cumulative measures. Credit risk, by contrast, moves with pricing and leverage, which is what makes its inclusion the operative change in the 2026 edition.
The release carrying the announcement was distributed by Uniwire on July 15, 2026.