Corporate climate-related voluntary disclosures: Does potential greenwash exist among Australian high emitters reports?

This study examines the issue of greenwashing among corporate high emitters subject to government scrutiny. To do so, we investigate the relationship between the actual environmental performance, measured as carbon emissions, of companies subject to the Australian National Greenhouse Energy Reporting Act 2007 (NGER) and their climate-related voluntary disclosures. To measure climate-related disclosure, we construct a climate-related disclosure index based on four prominent frameworks and score corporate report content against that Index. Using a sample of 150 companies with NGER emissions data for Years 2016 and 2017, a period that precedes the issuance of recommendations for disclosure by the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosure (TCFD), our regression results show a disappointingly low level of climate-related disclosure by most companies. We also find a negative relationship between climate-related disclosure and 1-year lagged environmental performance among companies exhibiting a year-on-year rise in carbon emissions. That is, our findings provide evidence of potential greenwashing by poor environmental performers, presumably to change negative perceptions by stakeholders, as predicted by socio-political theories. In contrast, we find no evidence of greenwashing among companies experiencing a year-on-year decrease in emissions.     

Giving at the close: Experimental evidence on cooperation in contributing to a public good

We present a simple dynamic model of contributions to a public good. We test the model by conducting a public good game experiment and fundraising experiment among religious Jewish students for the procurement of sustainable supplies for their campus synagogue. The results of the experiments show a high level of cooperation; particularly, the results of the public good experiment show that contributions are above the predicted optimum. Nevertheless, in accordance with the economic theory, we find that the contribution path is upward sloping and contributions increase with the benefit of the public good. Our findings also suggest that the level of contributions and their path are affected by peer and gender effects.     

Robust results on the sharing of firm-specific information: Incentives and welfare effects

Contrary to much of the existing literature, we obtain robust and clear-cut results for the incentives and welfare effects of information sharing when information is firm-specific. We show that firms’ incentives to share this type of information are aligned with social welfare. Whenever revealing information is the dominant strategy (such as for Cournot firms revealing costs or Cournot and Bertrand firms revealing demand), it is socially beneficial. Only cost information in Bertrand competition will not be revealed but this is socially desirable, too. These findings are independent of distributional assumptions on random shocks and signals and hold for general asymmetric oligopoly with any mixture of substitute, complementary and independent goods.     

Biased voluntary disclosure

We provide a bridge between the voluntary disclosure and the earnings management literature. Voluntary disclosure models focus on managers’ discretion in deciding whether or not to provide truthful voluntary disclosure to the capital market. Earnings management models, on the other hand, concentrate on managers’ discretion in deciding how to bias their mandatory disclosure. By analyzing managers’ disclosure strategy when disclosure is voluntary and not necessarily truthful, we show the robustness of voluntary disclosure theory to the relaxation of the standard assumption of truthful reporting. We also demonstrate the sensitivity of earnings management theory to the commonly made mandatory disclosure assumption.     

Perceived crisis management and its effect on re-election: the case of local government in Israel under the Second Lebanon War

The performance of local authority heads in times of emergency is a topic that has apparently received very little attention in the research literature. The same is true with regards to the relationship between performance and re-election chances in crisis situations. The hybrid macro polity view makes it possible to ‘pit’ the rational school of objective performance against the bounded rationality school of perceived performance. We examine which of the two is better at explaining the replacement or re-election of the incumbent local authority head in 17 local authorities in the North of Israel, after the Second Lebanon War. In the “Beauty Queen” contest between perceived and objective performance, the perceived performance appears to be a clear winner.     

Calorie information effects on consumers' food choices: Sources of observed gender heterogeneity

A larger portion of males is overweight than is females. Females' food choices in comparison to those of males reflect the greater importance that females attribute to health and physical appearance; their more complex attitude toward risk; the greater esteem in which they hold home-cooked food; and sociological factors. This paper explores the variables that affect consumers' food choices, shedding light specifically on the choice process and analyzing whether gender affects predispositions toward foods, perceptions, choice processes, or all three. Perceptions and choice processes based on memory judgments serve only as a benchmark used to compare choices consumers make under calorie information. The results of two experiments wherein the researchers exposed subjects to two forms of calorie information on three fast food items suggest that differences in perceptions of foods' healthfulness and taste aspects account for gender differences in memory-based choices. In addition to this baseline difference in perceptions, a gender difference in reaction to calorie information in terms of consumers' behavior exists. While calorie information affected both perceptions and choice processes for females, information changed the perceptions of food only for males.     

Whose Innovation Performance Benefits More from External Networks: Entrepreneurial or Conservative Firms?

The primary contribution of this research is positing and empirically supporting the proposition that learning through external networks disproportionately benefits conservative, risk‐averse firms. The construct, entrepreneurial orientation (EO), is used to discriminate conservative, risk‐averse firms from proactive, risk‐seeking firms. Organizational learning theory and social capital theory are employed to support our hypotheses. Based on a study of 1978 U.S. firms, the paper suggests that the utilization of external networks (i.e., the process of learning from information, perspectives, and insights embedded in external networks) may act as a primary driver for innovation for those firms that are either not inclined and/or do not have the capabilities to adopt entrepreneurial culture. Specifically, weak EO firms' innovation performance benefits from utilizing external networks more than strong EO firms'. This research also tests for the moderating role of firm size and finds that the negative moderating effect of EO on the external network utilization–innovation performance relationship is more pronounced in small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) than large firms.     

Dynamics of credit spread moments of European corporate bond indexes

Traditional quantitative credit risk models assume that changes in credit spreads are normally distributed but empirical evidence shows that they are likely to be skewed, fat-tailed, and change behaviour over time. Not taking into account such characteristics can compromise calculation of loss probabilities, pricing of credit derivatives, and profitability of trading strategies. Therefore, the aim of this study is to investigate the dynamics of higher moments of changes in credit spreads of European corporate bond indexes using extensions of GARCH type models that allow for time-varying volatility, skewness and kurtosis of changes in credit spreads as well as a regime-switching GARCH model which allows for regime shifts in the volatility of changes in credit spreads. Performance evaluation methods are used to assess which model captures the dynamics of observed distribution of the changes in credit spreads, produces superior volatility forecasts and Value-at-Risk estimates, and yields profitable trading strategies. The results presented can have significant implications for risk management, trading activities, and pricing of credit derivatives.     

The effects of information about health hazards in food on consumers’ choice process

This study examines the effects of context (health hazard), direction (positive versus negative) and intensity of information about health hazards on consumers’ choice processes. We propose that choice of frequently purchased food commodities, ceteris paribus, is based on a single dimension—taste. We develop a set of hypotheses regarding the type of choice process to be employed in various information types and empirically test them in a field experiment design. Our results indicate that a single-dimension choice process is employed under a nonsevere message and a multidimensional process under high-intensity negative information.