Information Disclosure Strategies Research Articles

Strategic disclosure of carrier’s carbon emission reduction information by competitive shippers in marine supply chains

The growing consumers’ environmental consciousness has driven competitive shippers (cargo owners) to voluntarily disclose carbon emission reduction (CER) information about their carriers (transportation service providers), aiming to establish a low-carbon image and enhance their competitiveness. Unfortunately, due to the low transparency in marine supply chains, profit-driven shippers are inclined to selectively disclose CER information. To address this, the independent audit by Environmental Non-Governmental Organizations (ENGOs) can be an effective mechanism. An analytical model is proposed to examine competitive shippers’ equilibrium information disclosure strategies, considering the asymmetry of CER information and the ENGOs’ adult. Our findings reveal the potential for an asymmetric equilibrium, where only one shipper chooses to disclose information while the other does not. We also identify two types of Prisoner’s dilemma situations when the acquiring information cost is moderate, and which dilemma can arise depending on the probability of an ENGO audit. Specifically, an increase in the probability of ENGO audits may backfire, leading shippers to reduce their CER investments and exacerbate the Prisoner’s dilemma. Our findings offer practical implications for shippers and policymakers in promoting environmental sustainability across the industry, particularly in the face of intense competition and the lack of accessible CER information.

Does Scarce Inventory Information Disclosure Strategy Promote Online Sales?

In pursuit of promoting sales, certain e-commerce vendors post scarce inventory messages on product pages to signal impending stockouts. To explore how disclosure information strategy regarding scarce inventory influences online sales, this study utilizes Chinese e-commerce data collected from February 1st to April 30th, 2023 and constructs an empirical model that delves into the relationship between the disclosure of scarce inventory information and online sales based on the signal theory. The empirical findings reveal a positive impact of scarce inventory information disclosure on online sales, with this impact being more pronounced under the moderating role of the commodity discount rate. These results hold substantial theoretical implications and offer valuable insights for practical applications in the e-commerce domain.

Delegation and salary information disclosure strategies of customer acquisition and retention

Purpose The purpose of this study to improve the efficiency of customer acquisition and retention through the design of salary information disclosure mechanism. Design/methodology/approach This study develops a stylized game-theoretic model of delegating customer acquisition and retention, focusing on how firms choose delegation and wage information disclosure strategy. Findings The results confirm the necessity for enterprises to disclose salary information. When sales agents are risk neutral, firms should choose multi-agent (MA) delegation and disclose their wages. However, when agents are risk averse, firms may disclose the wages of acquisition agents or both agents in MA delegation, depending on the uncertainty of the retention market. Originality/value This paper contributes to the literature on delegation of customer acquisition and retention and demonstrates that salary disclosure can be used as a supplement to the incentive mechanism.

Hide away from implication: potential environmental reputation spillover and strategic concealment of supply chain partners’ identities

PurposeThis research investigates whether focal firms employ strategic supply chain information disclosure, focusing on the concealment of supplier and customer identities, as part of their supply chain environmental risk management strategies (supplier sustainability risk and customer loss risk, respectively).Design/methodology/approachUsing a panel dataset of Chinese listed firms from 2009 to 2019 and utilizing the suppliers’ environmental punishment of peer firms (peer events) as an exogenous shock and employing ordinary least squares (OLS) estimation, this study conducts a regression analysis to test how focal firms disclose the identities of their suppliers and customers.FindingsOur results indicate that focal firms prefer to hide the identities of their suppliers and customers following the environmental punishment of peer firms’ suppliers. In addition, supplier concentration weakens the effect of withholding supplier identities, whereas customer concentration strengthens the effect of hiding customer identities. Mechanism analysis shows that firms hide supplier identities to avoid their reputation being affected and hide customer identities to prevent the deterioration of customers’ reputations and thus impact their market share.Originality/valueOur study reveals that reputation spillover is another crucial factor in supply chain transparency. It is also pioneering in applying the anonymity theory to explain focal firms’ information disclosure strategy in supply chains.

Unveiling the influence of transparency in risk communication: Shifting from information disclosure to uncertainty reduction

While the importance of government transparency is extensively discussed in risk communication literature, its practical application in risk contexts presents intricate challenges. This study introduces a redefined concept of transparency in the context of risk, covering two dimensions: information disclosure and uncertainty reduction. To investigate the impact of transparency, ranging from mere information disclosure to significant uncertainty reduction, a hierarchical multiple regression model is employed. Specifically, trust in government serves as a benchmark for information disclosure, while indicators for information disclosure strategies and public vulnerability are incorporated into the model as proxies for uncertainty reduction. The proposed model undergoes validation in a city lockdown scenario in China using self-report data from 435 college students, with anxiety serving as a benchmark for transparency outcomes. The findings suggest that indicators of uncertainty reduction (information disclosure strategies, individual vulnerability) exert much larger effects on anxiety than mere information disclosure (indicated by government trust). This implies that government transparency should prioritize uncertainty reduction, involving diverse strategies and addressing public vulnerabilities.

Catalyzing success in equity crowdfunding: trust-building strategies through signaling

AbstractBuilding trust is a major challenge in digital crowdfunding environments. The existing information asymmetries between fund-seeking entrepreneurs and potential investors require the implementation of signaling strategies between both economic agents in order to generate trust and incentivize investment. This study performs a qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) to explore the interplay of visual content and social networks as information cues signaling trust. The data are sourced from Startupxplore, a Spanish equity crowdfunding platform. Configurational analysis reveals a certain degree of substitutability between traditional visual cues (images, videos) and reporting presence in social networks (Instagram, Facebook, Twitter). The results show different information disclosure strategies using traditional visual cues and social networks that lead to crowdfunding success and overfunding: substitute, mixed and unique strategies. The originality of this research lies in identifying such strategies using a configurational approach that addresses the causal complexity behind success and overfunding phenomena in equity crowdfunding, and in targeting visual cues and social networks presence as signals. This entails theoretical contributions to signaling theory in digital financial environments as well as managerial implications for entrepreneurial fundraising.

Selling mode choice and blockchain adoption in an e-commerce platform with information disclosure

Many e-commerce platforms, such as Amazon and JD.com, consider product information disclosure as a crucial retail strategy. However, due to potential consumer distrust in the disclosed information, these platforms may employ blockchain technology to validate the information and alleviate consumers’ doubts. This study presents a game-theoretical model to investigate the interaction among the manufacturer’s choice of selling mode, the platform’s decision regarding blockchain adoption, and information disclosure strategies in the presence of information asymmetry. Optimal pricing and information disclosure strategies are derived, and the impact of various parameters on the equilibrium results is analyzed. We find that the consumers’ privacy concerns and blockchain implementation costs both have negative effects on the equilibrium retail price, disclosed information amount and profits of the manufacturer and platform. Moreover, we also find that the introduction of blockchain has different effects on a platform’s pricing and information disclosure strategies depending on the market size. In addition, conditions are identified under which the manufacturer selects the optimal selling mode and the platform makes an optimal decision on blockchain adoption. The findings demonstrate that the cost of consumers’ privacy concerns and the commission rate play significant roles in determining the equilibrium selling mode selection and blockchain adoption strategies.

Risk Contagion of Local Government Implicit Debt Integrating Complex Network and Multi-Subject Coordination

This article analyzes the risk contagion mechanism of local government implicit debt from the perspective of multi-subject collaboration, considering interaction effects among different influencing factors. On this basis, with the help of complex network theory and mean field theory, a risk contagion model of local government implicit debt is constructed, and then the evolution characteristics and control strategies for risk contagion of local government implicit debt are analyzed theoretically and simulated. The main findings obtained from the study are: (1) A scale-free network is not conducive to the risk contagion of local government implicit debt, while the opposite is true for a random network. (2) Information openness accuracy and information disclosure strategy both exhibit a positive “U” shaped relationship with the risk contagion of local government implicit debt. Debt management level, emotional tendency, risk preference level, credit policy robustness, accountability mechanism soundness, and perfection of laws and regulations are all negatively correlated with the risk contagion of local government implicit debt. (3) In order to effectively reduce the risk contagion intensity of local government implicit debt, local governments at all levels should continuously strengthen their debt management capabilities and information openness, and the central government should continuously improve accountability mechanisms, laws, and regulations. At the same time, financial institutions and the media should actively play the role of “stabilizers”. However, the local government implicit debt risk is an inherent risk, and its control focus should be on reducing rather than eliminating the risk.

The closer the better: Supplier geographic proximity and corporate information disclosure violation

This study examines the association between supplier geographic proximity and corporate information disclosure violation. Using panel data with 13,775 firm-year observations of listed firms in China, we find that a supplier geographically closer to a firm (geographic proximity) can suppress the firm's information disclosure violation. This relationship is more pronounced when the supplier provides more specific investments and the firm is a non-state-owned enterprise. The main finding holds after using various measures to address endogeneity, including propensity scorematching and instrumental variable method. Overall, our research suggests the supplier's governance effect on a firm’s information disclosure strategy.

The Interaction Between Information Disclosure Strategy and Channel Structure in Platform Retailing: The Role of Product Returns

ABSTRACT Different information disclosure formats have been implemented to solve the severe product-return issue in platform retail. Considering the significant impact of channel structure choice on the information disclosure strategy, we explore their interaction by investigating the role of product returns. A multistage sequential game model is built in a supply chain comprising a platform and supplier. First, we derive the equilibrium pricing decisions in the short term and examine the role of product returns. Second, we study the optimal information disclosure strategy and channel structure choice in the long term. We also investigate the impact of the optimal strategy on the entire supply chain’s profits and consumer surplus. The following results were obtained: (1) Under the no information disclosure strategy, the presence of product returns weakens the impact of double marginalization in the wholesale model. Therefore, the information disclosure strategy improves product returns, but aggravates the double marginalization effect. (2) Information disclosure benefits the consumer and supply-chain members who disclose information, but may hurt the entire supply chain due to its negative spillover effect on other supply-chain members. (3) The optimal channel structure choice for the platform depends on the trade-off between these two effects of the information disclosure strategy on product returns. Therefore, platforms and suppliers should reexamine their attitudes toward product returns and be aware that more information is not always better, because of the impact of product returns.

Voluntary information disclosure of an e-commerce platform under reselling, marketplace, and hybrid selling

This study investigates an e-commerce platform's incentive to voluntarily disclose demand information to an upstream manufacturer. In contrast to previous studies that emphasize the platform's mandatory (or ex-ante) information disclosure, this study examines voluntary (or ex-post) information disclosure, which allows the platform to selectively decide whether to perform information disclosure based on the level of forecast demand. The typical online selling channels in which the platform or the manufacturer (or both) play the role of seller are identified as reselling, marketplace, and hybrid cases. In each transaction case, the interactions between the platform's information disclosure strategy, the level of forecast demand, the platform's forecasting capability, the degree of demand uncertainty, and channel substitutability are analyzed. We find that information on good market demand should be withheld in the reselling case, information indicating a slightly below-average market condition should be withheld in the marketplace case, and information on good or poor demand should be withheld in the hybrid case. The platform is more likely to perform information disclosure as the forecasting capability or the degree of demand uncertainty increases. Moreover, both the platform and the manufacturer can benefit from a well-formulated voluntary information disclosure strategy. Our findings show e-commerce platforms how to better exploit demand forecast information in a voluntary disclosure setting and provide an explanation for practices such as their focus on improving their forecasting capability and market potential.

Using Smart Applications in Delivering Government Services in the UAE

This study addresses the public adoption of and satisfaction with UAE government e-services, emphasizing the quality of digital platforms, mainly smart applications. This quantitative research uses the technology acceptance, e-service quality, and web trust models. An online survey designed via Survey Monkey was distributed to Emirati citizens in Sharjah, Dubai, and Abu Dhabi municipalities via government Facebook and Instagram accounts in December 2022. The sample included the Ministries of Human Resources, Education, Interior, and Foreign Affairs, which provide daily individual and commercial services to citizens through digital applications. Three hundred respondents completed the form. The findings revealed that participants appreciate and trust the electronic services provided via smart applications, particularly their ease of use and quality of information. Factors motivating their use include information disclosure strategy and interactivity. The UAE's increasing use of smart digital applications necessitates training, user-friendly designs, and integration with rather than replacement of traditional direct methods.

Interaction between channel characteristics and quality disclosure

Online retailers can provide more product quality information in different ways with different information technologies (e.g., product simulators and virtual reality) in order to reduce consumers’ uncertainty about the product quality. We suggest that online retailers should combine the influence of online channel characteristics and the quality of product attributes in the information disclosure strategy. We introduce a dynamic model in the environment of a two-echelon supply chain. Product quality and information disclosure are endogenous in this model. Our research shows that if the degree of information disclosure and the cost of disclosure are low, the best choice for the online retailer is to disclose high-quality attribute (searchable attribute or experiential attribute) quality information. Interestingly, if the degree of information disclosure is high, the best choice for the online retailer is to disclose low-quality attribute (searchable attribute or experiential attribute) quality information. In addition, manufacturers’ profits and product quality may present a U-shaped relationship under the equilibrium state.

Explore information disclosure strategies in pre-loved luxury digital market

ABSTRACT The pre-loved luxury market has attracted more attention from both practitioners and researchers, yet empirical research on this market remains scarce. Since information asymmetry is a bigger challenge in the pre-loved luxury digital market, it is essential to understand the effectiveness of different information disclosure strategies. This paper finds that the information disclosure effect is important yet complicated in the pre-loved luxury digital market. Not only does it depend on how much information to disclose, it also depends on what type of information to share. While providing more product images helps to sell preowned luxury products faster, providing benchmark price information may backfire. Further exploring the mechanism, we find that information disclosure influences sales also through other marketing mix. Interestingly, more product image information reduces consumers’ price sensitivity, but extra benchmark price information increases consumers’ price sensitivity. Actionable managerial implications are provided to guide sellers on leveraging information disclosure strategies in this market.

Quality information gaps in housing listings: Do words mean the same as pictures?

The incomplete or defective information on the listed housing quality may impair the market clearing processes, may lead to the adverse selection and would have its reflection in the data needed to perform market analyses. To pinpoint the existing information gaps, this paper inspects the quality-related information disclosure strategies of agents who list apartments for sale or rent in online listing platforms. The first part of the empirical study compares the direct declarations of the listed housing quality with the quality indirectly signaled via photos attached to listings and shows that there extists a discrepancy between them. Combined with the high share of observations, for which the full information on quality is not being disclosed it contributes to the existence of informations gaps. The second part of the study answers, whether indirect textual quality signals (descriptions of apartments), processed with the use of Wordscores—a supervised machine learning algorithm are consistent with visual quality signals. It has been documented, that the sales listings’ quality signals have agreed in 63–90% of cases, depending on the model’s variant. For the rental market, the descriptive quality signals have matched the visual ones in 71–83% of cases. Moreover, it has been shown that among rental listings the consistency has been higher for listings posted by landlords, while for sales listings—by brokers. Finally, it may be argued that to fill the existing information gaps one may utilize the often-unused information conveyed via textual quality-signalling channel.

Critical factors influencing information disclosure in public organisations

Open government initiatives around the world and the passage of freedom of information laws are opening public organisations through information disclosure to ensure transparency and encourage citizen participation and engagement. At the municipal level, social, economic, and political factors are found to account for this trend. However, the findings on this issue are inconclusive and may differ from country to country. This paper contributes to this discussion by analysing a unitary country where the same set of laws and rules governs the constituent municipalities. It seeks to identify critical factors that affect the disclosure of municipal information. For this purpose, a longitudinal study was carried out over a period of 4 years using panel data methodology. The main conclusions seem to point to municipalities’ intention to increase the dissemination of information to reduce low levels of voter turnout and increase civic involvement and political participation. Municipalities governed by leftist parties and those that have high indebtedness are most likely to disclose information. Additionally, internet access has created new opportunities for citizens to access information, which exerts pressure for greater dissemination of information by municipalities. These findings are important to practitioners because they indicate the need to improve citizens’ access to the Internet and maintain information disclosure strategies beyond election periods.

Production outsourcing decision in the presence of consumer’s preference uncertainty

We investigate upstream coopetition and competition in a supply chain in the context of a high-quality brand manufacturer’s strategy on upstream outsourcing and e-commerce platform’s strategy on downstream information disclosure. The high-quality brand manufacturer outsources production and sells through an e-commerce platform, where a low-quality manufacturer also sells. The high-quality manufacturer may outsource to a third manufacturer who produces only the brand manufacturer’s high-quality product, maintaining a competition relationship with the low-quality manufacturer (competition strategy). The high-quality brand manufacturer also has the option to outsource to the low-quality manufacturer, entering into a coopetition relationship (coopetition strategy). The consumers have knowledge about the quality of the two products, but they are uncertain about their quality preference. That is, they are not sure which of the two quality-differentiated products available in the market will meet their own needs. Their uncertainty can be eliminated by the e-commerce platform’s disclosure of preference-revealing information. We find that the brand manufacturer prefers the coopetition strategy when the ratio of the two products’ cost-quality efficiencies is very low or moderate. The e-commerce platform has an incentive to disclose preference-revealing information when the ratio of the two products’ cost-quality efficiencies is moderate or high. We show the optimal strategies of the supply chain with the brand manufacturer’s outsourcing strategy and the platform’s information disclosure strategy, and we also extend the discussion to the impacts of several related issues.

Does performance persistence below aspirations affect firms' accounting information disclosure strategies? An empirical study based on reliability and comparability

AbstractIntegrating the behavioral theory of the firm and agency theory, this study is the first to examine the antecedents of firms' choice to disclose low‐quality accounting information from the perspective of performance persistence below aspirations. Based on empirical data of 31,326 firm‐annual observations involving 3584 listed companies for the 2007–2021 period, we find that firms actively reduce accounting information reliability and comparability in the presence of performance persistence below aspirations. Furthermore, we find that CEO‐CFO surname ties enhance the negative effect of performance persistence below aspirations on accounting information comparability. Finally, we find that agency costs play a mediating role in the relationship that performance persistence below aspirations has with accounting information reliability and comparability. This study is the first to examine performance persistence below aspirations and accounting information reliability and comparability. Meanwhile, this study provides important insights for policymakers to improve the quality of capital market information and for shareholders to improve the quality of corporate governance.

Brand Premium and Carbon Information Disclosure Strategy: Evidence from China Listed Companies

Could the corporate carbon information disclosure strategy influence a firm’s brand value, and how does corporate carbon information affect it? Previous research mainly examines the impact of ESG information disclosure on firm value and other financial indicators, but little research has focused on the effect of carbon information on brand value. This paper focuses on the influence of corporate carbon information disclosure on brand value, and we find that it positively impacts corporate brand value. In addition, when a company chooses to adopt a more quantitative and diverse carbon information strategy, it increases its brand value. We also examine the potential mechanisms involved in how corporate carbon information disclosure influences brand value. We focus on three types of factor: analyst rating, customer attitude, and corporate financial performance, and find that higher analyst forecasts and positive customer attitudes have a positive impact on the association between the carbon information strategy and corporate brand value. In contrast, corporate financial performance provides only weak evidence. These results are consistent with demands by users for more precise guidelines from regulators and standard-setters for measuring and disclosing carbon-related information.

Substitution or complementary effects between hosts and neighbors’ information disclosure: Evidence from Airbnb

Prior studies have attributed and confirmed the importance of hosts’ information disclosure on boosting their performance due to the prominent information asymmetry on peer-to-peer rental platforms. This study takes a step further by analyzing how hosts and neighbors’ disclosure of descriptions simultaneously and interactively influences the review volume and performance of Airbnb listings. Based on a panel dataset and fixed effect regression models, the results confirmed the findings of prior studies that self-disclosure of descriptions has a positive effect on the review volume and performance. We also initially find a substitute effect between self-disclosure of descriptions and neighbors’ disclosure of public information, with a complementary effect between self-disclosure of descriptions and neighbors’ disclosure of private information. As a novel attempt to analyze the effect of neighbors’ information disclosure on property performance, this study provides important implications for relevant literature and for hospitality professionals to improve information disclosure strategies.