The effects of environmental,social and governance disclosure on the cost of capital in small and medium enterprises: The role of family business status

Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) disclosure has become a critical component of corporate reporting. However, the effectiveness of this type of disclosure remains poorly explored among small and medium enterprises (SMEs), despite the fact that these businesses represent the majority of firms around the world. By leveraging on a dataset of Italian listed SMEs, we fill this gap to shed new light on the effects of nonfinancial disclosure on the cost of capital. The study reveals that, in stark contrast with the evidence on large companies, environmental disclosure for SMEs is bound to provoke an increase in the cost of capital. Yet this pattern is capsized when the company is a family SME, as it benefits from environmental disclosure, as large companies do.     

Corporate carbon risk,voluntary disclosure,and cost of capital: South African evidence

The study examines the interplay among corporate carbon risk, voluntary disclosure, and cost of capital within the context of South Africa, a “rising power” in the climate policy debate. We develop a system of simultaneous equations models and analyze data drawn from firms traded on the Johannesburg Securities Exchange (JSE), for the period 2010 to 2015, using the three‐stage least squares procedure. We find that voluntary carbon disclosure is associated with lower overall (and equity) cost of capital, after controlling for corporate carbon risk. We also find that firms with higher carbon risk tend to provide better quality carbon disclosure and signal the possibility of high carbon risk to avoid negative market reactions resulting from concealing carbon information. Although the capital market does not appear to incorporate individual firm's carbon risk exposure into the required cost of capital, we find that it generally requires higher returns for companies operating in carbon‐intensive sectors. These findings suggest that firms could exploit the virtues of voluntary carbon disclosure to reduce their overall (and equity) cost of capital. Our findings also imply that regulators and policymakers could point to the cost of capital reducing role of voluntary disclosure to lure firms into voluntarily providing superior quality carbon disclosures.     

Non-financial strategy disclosure and environmental,social and governance score: Insight from a configurational approach

Evaluating the determinants of environmental, social and governance (ESG) score is significant for topic for academics and regulators and companies. Despite its importance, little attention has been paid to non-financial strategy disclosure and how to communicate non-financial information. However, in the recent years, attention to the topic has considerably increased as demonstrated, in the European context, by the introduction of the non-financial reporting directive in 2014. Therefore, it is important to analyse how the quantity and quality of disclosure influence the ESG score. To explore this relationship, a configurational analysis aimed at 31 Italian listed companies was studied by fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis. The results showed that there were three path types driving the ESG score and that integrated reporting played a highly significant role in promoting a high ESG score. Specifically, we show the importance of assessing the combinations of quality and quantity disclosures for ESG score through configurational thinking. These results provide a first theoretical basis for the effectiveness of disclosure measurements on ESG score, charting the future direction for environmental management studies.     

Toward sustainable corporate behavior: The effect of the critical mass of female directors on environmental,social, and governance disclosure

Boards of directors have recently become more attentive to their stakeholders' concerns, providing more transparent information and adopting more sustainable business strategies. This study investigates the influence of a critical mass of women on boards on the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) disclosure score and its three components separately. Using a sample of the FTSE-MIB listed companies in the 2005–2017 period, we show that reaching a critical mass of female board members—going from one or two women to at least three—enhances the level of ESG disclosure. The results also show that the critical mass of female board members has a positive influence on every component of the ESG score, with the highest contribution of women reaching the governance score. These findings provide insights to shareholders and policymakers and suggest that a critical mass of female board members is particularly effective in improving transparency, and it can be seen as a mechanism to transit to stakeholder governance, fostering more sustainable behavior in firms.     

The impact of direct environmental,social, and governance reporting: Empirical evidence in European-listed companies in the agri-food sector

Companies are continuously pressured for the dissemination of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) information, because of the constant debate on the issue of corporate sustainability, considered a critical and very important topic for society; despite this pressure, ESG's disclosure practices vary considerably from company to company, both in quantity and quality. The study aims to address the issue and verify the effectiveness of ESG reporting through the influence that the ESG disclosure has on profitability and value of listed European agri-food companies. The results obtained, studying a sample of 57 European-listed companies (EU28) in the agri-food sector observed in the period 2010–2018, show that the ESG disclosure practices of the companies impact corporate profitability; specifically, evidence is provided for the existence of a positive relationship between profitability and disclosure practices of strictly environmental and social information and a negative effect between company market value and disclosure practices relating to governance. These results suggest that greater transparency and accountability help to improve business profitability.     

Corporate carbon risk exposure,voluntary disclosure,and financial reporting quality

The study examines whether corporate carbon risk exposure is associated with financial reporting quality and whether voluntary carbon disclosure mediates the relationship. We analyze data drawn from firms traded on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE), for the period 2011 to 2015. We document robust evidence that firms with higher carbon risk exposure tend to provide financial statements of poorer quality (i.e., direct effect) and this association is partially mediated through voluntary carbon disclosure (i.e., indirect effect). The overall negative association between corporate carbon risk exposure and the firm's financial reporting quality is partly explained by the quality of voluntary carbon disclosure.     

Environmental,Social and Governance Reporting in China

What is the current state of environmental, social and governance (ESG) reporting and what is the relation between ESG reporting and the financial performance of Chinese companies? This study analyses corporate ESG disclosure in China between 2005 and 2012 by analysing the members of the main indexes of the biggest Chinese stock exchanges. After discussing theories that explain the ESG performance of firms such as institutional theory, accountability and stakeholder theory we present uni‐ and multivariate statistical analyses of ESG reporting and its relation to environmental and financial performance. Our results suggest that ownership status and membership of certain stock exchanges influence the frequency of ESG disclosure. In turn, ESG reporting influences both environmental and financial performance. We conclude that the main driver for ESG disclosure is accountability and that Chinese corporations are catching up with respect to the frequency of ESG reporting as well as with respect to the quality. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

Sustainable development disclosure: Environmental,social, and governance reporting and gender diversity in the audit committee

This paper analyzes the link between female representation on audit committees (ACs) and specific information attributes of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) disclosures. We also examine whether the role of women is moderated by the busyness and intensity of the committee. Our results reveal a positive association between gender diversity in the AC and the quality of voluntary ESG reporting, which results in greater comprehensiveness and relevance. These findings extend the academic debate concerning the role of female directors on sustainability policies. Moreover, given the importance of ESG information in capital markets and its potential benefits for firms, this evidence may help regulators and owners to implement adequate corporate governance mechanisms. In addition, the busyness of the AC negatively moderates the influence of female AC members. Therefore, we highlight the need to consider the context in which women work in order to understand their influence on sustainability reporting.     

Exploring environmental,social, and governance disclosure effects on the S&P 500 financial performance

Much of the literature measuring the relationship between environmental, social, and governance (ESG) scores and firm performance treats the score as a measure of sustainability performance. In this study, we treat a firm's ESG score as a demonstration of strategic choice in the level of transparency that results in increased firm performance as measured by Tobin's Q and return on assets. Performance differences are a result of choice moderated by the size of the firm as measured by employees and sales. We analyze 467 firms in the S&P 500 from 2009 to 2015. Applying legitimacy and stakeholder theory, we find that there is significant difference between groups with respect to disclosure and performance. The results of quartile analysis by sales, capitalization, and Tobin's Q are relevant to understand the influence that the ESG score has on financial performance. ESG influences on Tobin's Q are greatest for large firms as measured by sales, as opposed to the ESG affects on Tobin's Q and return on asset for smallest firms as measured by market capitalization.     

The impact of sustainability (environmental,social, and governance) disclosure and board diversity on firm value: The moderating role of industry sensitivity

Using a large panel data set comprising 812 listed European firms, this study investigates whether sustainability disclosure (environmental, social, and governance) and female representation on boards affect firm value. We observe a positive impact of sustainability disclosure and board gender diversity on firm value, suggesting that the best management practices, enhanced stakeholder trust, and female representation on boards improve firm value. We observe that the firms in sensitive industries achieve superior social and governance performance. We also observe that the firms with higher female representation on their boards present significantly superior environmental, social, and governance performance. Our results are robust to different firm and country specific control variables and to year‐ and country‐fixed effects.     

Mandatory disclosure,greenhouse gas emissions and the cost of equity capital: UK evidence of a U-shaped relationship

This paper examines the effects of disclosing greenhouse gas (GHG) information mandatorily on the cost of equity capital (COC) using a longitudinal unbalanced panel database of the United Kingdom's FTSE 350 firms for the period 2011–2016. We use a nonlinear panel quantile regression (PQR) model to examine the relationship between GHG disclosure (GHGD) and COC in the United Kingdom. This technique was supplemented by conducting a two-step generalised method of moment (GMM) estimation to address any concerns related to the potential existence of endogeneity problems. Our findings suggest that high-level GHGD appeared to be negatively associated with COC up to a certain level, which is known as the turning point; then, any increase in GHGD is likely to increase the COC. This means that the nonlinear association between GHGD and COC is evidenced in our study and takes a U shape. Likewise, our findings are associative of a moderating effect of the 2013 carbon disclosure regulation (CDR) on the GHGD–COC nexus. We argue that mandatory GHGD and GHG risk are linked so that those companies that are associated with higher GHG risk have a tendency to be better disclosers. Consequently, we urge regulators to design GHGD regulations in a way that mirrors corporate environmental risk and leads to a lower COC in order to align the interests of corporations with those of the society at large.     

Financial fragility,sovereign default risk and the limits to commercial bank bail-outs

We show that with intertwined weak banks and weak sovereigns, bank recapitalizations become much less effective. We construct a DSGE model with leverage constrained banks lending to firms and holding domestic government bonds. Bond prices reflect endogenously generated sovereign risk. This introduces a negative amplification cycle: after a credit crisis output losses increase more because higher interest rates trigger lower bond prices and subsequent losses at banks. This further tightens bank leverage constraints, and causes interest rates to rise further. Also bank recapitalizations are then much less effective. Recaps involve swaps of newly issued sovereign bonds for bank equity, the new debt increases sovereign debt discounts, leading to capital losses for the banks on their holdings of sovereign debt that (partially) offset the impact of the recapitalization. The favorable macroeconomic effects of bank recaps on the recovery after a financial crisis are correspondingly lower.     

Modern pandemic crises and default risk: Worldwide evidence

This article examines the relationship between modern health pandemic crises and financial stability. Specifically, it collects data on 250,223 firms in 43 countries (or regions) during five modern pandemic crises, SARS (2003), H1N1 (2009), MERS (2012), Ebola (2014), and Zika (2016), and finds that pandemic crises significantly increase the default risk of enterprises. Further analysis shows that formal and informal institutions acted as a “cushion” against the pandemic crisis. The earlier a country adopts IFRS, the more unimpeded access to information, and the more stable religious and ethnic relations within the country can reduce the negative impact of a pandemic on financial stability. This article addresses the hitherto inadequacy of COVID-related data. In addition, this article argues that governments should build sound state institutions to withstand macroeconomic shocks and highlights the heterogeneity of default risk for enterprises operating in countries with different institutions.     

Corporate commitment to climate change action,carbon risk exposure,and a firm's debt financing policy

Motivated by the rising consensus that corporate engagement in climate change actions holds the key for society's transition into environmentally resilient economy, the study examines whether a firm's commitment to climate change action and its carbon risk exposure shape the firm's debt financing policy. Based on insights drawn from signaling, corporate reputation, and agency theories, we develop models that link corporate commitment to climate change actions and a firm's carbon risk exposure with its debt financing decisions. Using data drawn from S&P 500 companies, for years 2015 to 2019, we find a robust evidence that firms that engage in higher levels of commitment to climate change actions issue a higher proportion of debt with longer terms to maturity, even after controlling for their carbon risk exposure. However, we do not find a robust evidence corroborating an association between firms' carbon risk exposure and their debt financing policy. These findings are consistent with arguments that high-commitment firms enjoy positive reputation, better credit rating, and reduced agency and information asymmetry costs, allowing them to gain easier access to long-term debt markets.     

Sovereign default risk,debt uncertainty and fiscal credibility: The case of Brazil

Since Credit Default Swaps spreads reflect the sovereign risk and, thus, the uncertainties related to government solvency, the goal of this study is to examine the relation between sovereign risk and debt uncertainty (measured by the disagreement in expectations about public debt) in an important developing country – Brazil. Furthermore, the paper analyzes whether fiscal credibility plays a key role in mitigating the effect of debt uncertainty on sovereign risk. The results suggest the disagreement in expectations about public debt affects the sovereign risk, and fiscal credibility plays a twofold role, it reduces sovereign risk, and it mitigates the effect of debt uncertainty on sovereign risk. Besides, quantile regression estimates reveal that fiscal credibility improvements are even more important when sovereign risk levels are higher.     

Carbon emissions,corporate governance,and staggered boards

Carbon emissions have been identified as a major cause of global warming and are harmful to the environment. Given the seriousness of climate changes, businesses are encouraged to adopt corporate strategies to improve environmental performance. Staggered boards (or classified boards) are one of the controversial corporate governance devices being employed by corporations that protect managers from the market for corporate control. This paper explores whether staggered boards can be a useful business strategy to improve carbon emissions. Relying on a novel data set in which the presence of a staggered board is identified through advanced machine learning algorithms and textual analysis, we find that staggered boards bring about significantly worse emission performance by 10.67%. Our results corroborate the premise that staggered boards insulate self-interested managers from market discipline and thus exacerbate agency problems, resulting in more unfavorable outcomes. Further analysis validates the results, that is, propensity score matching, entropy balancing, instrumental-variable analysis, and generalized method of moments (GMM) dynamic panel data estimation. Importantly, we include firm fixed effects to account for unobserved heterogeneity. Our findings indicate that de-staggered boards may help improve emission performance.     

政治关联、信息披露质量与债务融资成本

以2007年至2012年深圳证券交易所A股主板上市公司为研究对象,采用深交所公布的信息披露考评结果作为信息披露质量的代理变量,实证检验政治关联、信息披露质量和债务融资成本之间的关系,结果显示:企业信息披露质量的提升能够显著降低其债务融资成本;政治关联的存在削弱了企业信息披露质量与其债务融资成本之间的相关性。     

环境规制、流动性风险与债务融资成本

环境规制会影响企业经营和银行对企业的风险评价,进而影响企业债务融资成本。本文以我国A股2012~2017年重污染行业上市公司为研究对象,研究了环境规制对债务融资成本的具体影响。研究结果显示,环境规制强度对重污染企业债务融资成本具有正向影响作用;且这种影响效应在小规模企业和非国有企业更加显著;进一步研究发现,环境规制通过流动性风险路径影响企业债务融资成本。本文的研究丰富了企业债务融资成本相关文献,对企业加强债务融资管理与政府实施环保政策具有一定的启示作用。     

After Modigliani,Miller, and Hamada: A new way to estimate cost of capital

In this article, we discuss the impact of financial debt on shareholder value using a new approach that aims: (a) to explain the effect that leverage from debt has on a stock’s systematic risk, or what we shall call here “the systematic cost of leverage,” and (b) to account for default risk in the cost of equity, or what we shall call here “the cost of default.” Our assessment of systematic risk is based on a stochastic approach that is materially different from the one proposed by Hamada: the risk premium remunerates the investor for the probability of equity (expressed as market value) generating a return below that of the risk‐free rate. Furthermore, the approach we use to account for default risk is derived from reduced‐form models, but in this case, (a) we use real probabilities of default and not risk‐neutral probabilities, and (b) we extend the approach to stocks.     

Environmental transparency and investors' risk perception: Cross-country evidence on multinational corporations' sustainability practices and cost of equity

We explore whether a greater amount of environmental disclosure can reduce a firm's ex ante cost of equity. This could occur because the quantity of environmental information changes investors' risk perception of the company, thereby influencing its ex ante cost of equity. Our study is a cross-country analysis of 1481 multinational corporations (MNCs) across 43 countries and territories from 2013 to 2019. Firstly, we measure investors' risk perception as a firm's ex ante cost of equity by employing five different valuation models, all based on equity analysts' forecasted data. We then investigate whether large quantities of environmental information disclosed by an MNC affect its ex ante cost of equity. We find evidence that investors price the amount of environmental disclosure. More environmental disclosure decreases a firm's ex ante cost of equity because it lessens investors' information asymmetry. However, this relationship is non-linear. Once the amount of environmental disclosure data exceeds a certain threshold level, a firm's ex ante cost of equity will rise again. Our empirical results also suggest that non-financial factors at the country level play a role in shaping how investors perceive a firm's riskiness. Locating the firm in a country with better environmental performance and a higher score of the human development index can reduce investors' risk perception and result in a lower ex ante cost of equity. A policy implication of our findings is that a global standardised and effective corporate sustainability reporting is needed to provide investors a more holistic view for evaluating the riskiness of their investments.