Information Disclosure Research Articles

Climate change disclosure performance and audit fees: evidence from Australia

Purpose This study aims to examine the relationship between climate change disclosure performance (CCDP) and audit pricing. The moderating effect of corporate governance characteristics on that relationship is also investigated. Design/methodology/approach Using a sample of top 300 Australian Securities Exchange listed non-financial firms over the period 2008–2019, this study investigates the association between CCDP and audit fees. The findings are robust to a difference-in-difference test thereby alleviating potential endogeneity concerns. Findings CCDP is found to be significantly positively related to external auditor fees. Research limitations/implications The findings show some important implications for firm management, regulators, investors and auditors. This study presents empirical evidence that climate change, as a factor of external risk, influences audit fees. Practical implications Firms with governance structures characterized by larger more independent boards, larger audit committees and audit committees with a higher level of independence significantly moderate the relationship between CCDP and audit fees. Social implications Investors’ demand for firm transparency and disclosure of information regarding the risks of climate change, effects and opportunities has increased significantly over the past decade, as these factors could have a significant effect on valuation and investment decisions. Originality/value Importantly, stakeholders need to be aware of the costs of climate change, the quantification of climate change impacts and how firms address climate change in their business risk management processes. This study quantifies the impact of CCDP on auditor risk assessments via audit fees.

Information Seeking and Receiving of Older Adults with Diabetes in the Online Health Community: An Information Need Contextualization Perspective

ABSTRACT Online health communities (OHCs) are important online health communication channels for older adults with diabetes to access health information. When seeking health information, they often disclose a variety of contextual information (e.g., socio-economic situations) in their questions. Selective contextual information disclosure is a type of communication strategy for users in OHCs to elicit replies from others. In this study, we adopted text analysis to investigate what contextual information older adults with diabetes disclose to articulate their information needs and used the fixed-effect Poisson model to examine the relationships between different types of contextual information disclosure and informational support receipt. Our analyses were based on a dataset of 4,505 questions and corresponding replies from an online diabetes community. The results showed that cognitive information is the most frequently disclosed contextual information, while older adults tend to disclose demographic information in their questions less. Providing demographic and situational details in questions can enhance informational support receiving, resulting in an increased number of informational supports. However, disclosing cognitive, affective, informational channels, or support information does not significantly affect the informational support receiving. These findings can contribute to extending our existing understanding of information seekers’ communication strategies in OHCs.

Money matters: a critique of 'informed financial consent'.

In recent years, concerns about the financial burdens of health care and growing recognition of the relevance of cost to decision making and patient experience have increasingly focused attention on financial 'transparency' and disclosure of costs to patients. In some jurisdictions, there have been calls not only for timely disclosure of costs information, but also for 'informed financial consent'. However, simply putting the 'financial' into 'informed consent' and invoking an informed consent standard for cost information encounters several ethical, legal, and practical difficulties. This article will examine the viability and desirability of 'informed financial consent', and whether it is possible to derive ideas from traditional informed consent that may improve decision making and the patient experience. We argue that, while there are important legal, ethical, and practical challenges to consider, some of the principles of informed consent to treatment can usefully guide financial communication. We also argue that, while medical practitioners (and their delegates) have an important role to play in bridging the gap between disclosure and enabling informed (financial) decision making, this must be part of a multi-faceted approach to financial communication that acknowledges the influence of non-clinical providers and other structural forces on discharging such obligations.

What are the main drivers of SMEs’ production of sustainability reports?

This study aims to deepen our understanding of the theoretical frameworks that underlie SMEs' disclosure of sustainability information. Qualitative empirical research was conducted on SMEs that proactively engage in sustainability reporting. To identify the key drivers, interviews were conducted with a sample of Spanish SMEs, and the reasons for sustainability reporting provided by informants were ranked by frequency. Our findings indicate that stakeholder theory holds a prominent position, closely followed by legitimacy theory and the resource-based view. This ranking reveals a mixture of external and internal drivers, contributing to the existing literature by emphasizing the predominance of management factors over sociological arguments in favor of sustainability reporting in SMEs. Regulators, practitioners, and academics can benefit from these findings to better understand the decision-making processes of SMEs regarding sustainability reporting practices, while accounting for their relationships in the contexts in which they operate.

Digital transformation and innovation activities: evidence from publicly-listed firms in China

This study investigates the relationship between digital transformation (DT) and corporate innovation activities. By studying the publicly-listed firms in China, we find that firms with higher levels of DT tend to spend more on research and development (R&D) and tend to generate more innovation outputs. The impact of DT on R&D expenditures is particularly pronounced for firms with more limited disclosure of information, more complex organizational structures, and for those who do not receive government sponsorship. We find no evidence that DT affects innovation through alleviating financial constraints or enhancing operating performance. Collectively, these findings offer novel and practical insights into the interaction between digitization and firms’ innovation.

CEO industry tournament, investor attention, and company value

AbstractBased on the emerging capital market of China, this paper uses the data of Chinese listed companies to test the market value management behavior of CEOs under the incentive of industry tournaments. The empirical results show that the CEOs industry tournament improves the value of listed companies by attracting investor attention. In the test of the incentive mechanism of the industry tournament, we find that in the samples with lower industry mobility and state ownership and where the CEO is new, retiring, or a founder, the industry pay gap has a weaker incentive effect on the CEO. In the test of the CEOs' efforts to manage investor attention, this paper finds that CEOs are incentivized to disclose more financial and nonfinancial information, increase advertising spending, and hold more shareholder meetings. Discussed with other incentives, compensation incentives and equity incentives enhance the motivational role of industry championships for CEOs. This study explores in depth the possible impact of industry tournaments on CEO behavioral decisions and also provides a new perspective for corporate to manage investor attention. This provides important reference value for corporate CEO compensation, information disclosure supervision, and investor decision‐making.

Do nonlinear and interactive effects exist in live-streaming sellers’ disclosure of two-sided product information on consumers’ trust and purchase intention?

PurposeThis study examines the inverted U-shaped relationship between a live-streaming seller’s disclosure of two-sided product information and consumers’ trust in the seller and product. It also explores the interaction between these two types of information disclosure and their impact on purchase intention in the live-streaming sales context.Design/methodology/approachAn e-questionnaire survey was conducted in China, followed by multiple regression and structural equation modeling analyses.FindingsThe disclosure of both negative and positive product information is positively correlated with consumers’ trust in the seller or product but does not directly affect their purchase intention. Negative information disclosure neither enhances nor diminishes the positive impact of disclosing positive information on consumer trust.Practical implicationsLive-streaming sellers (i.e. retailers or manufacturers) should disclose both positive and negative product information to form consumers’ trust toward them (or products) and enhance sales.Social implicationsLive-streaming sellers often worry about the negative effects of excessive promotions or disclosure of positive or negative product information. However, these negative effects were not statistically significant.Originality/valueSince some researchers have found nonlinear effects of two-sided product information in other contexts, this study is the first to focus on the impact of live-streaming sellers’ disclosure of two-sided product information on consumers’ trust in the live-streaming sales context rather than on the information per se.

Research on the Impact of ESG Disclosure on Green Bond Issuance in New Energy from the Perspective of Carbon peak

With the goal of carbon peaking, low-carbon green development has become the main theme of economic development. In this context, while pursuing economic benefits, it is also necessary to take into account environmental benefits. Industrial development policies and matching funding strategies related to low-carbon green are called for, and sustainable economic strategies will make the industry move forward steadily. On the basis of foreign scholars' research on green bonds and industrial ESG, this project is based on the new energy industry, organizing and researching the information disclosed by its ESG, exploring in depth the influence of this information on the issuance of green bonds by the new energy industry, and exploring whether there is any positivity in this influence. The ESG information disclosed by the new energy industry can, on the one hand, help investors better understand ESG governance and the green bond market in the new energy industry, and guide them to make rational investments; on the other hand, it can help the government better formulate policies to improve the perfection of the green bond-related standards, including the evaluation system and certification system, as well as the quality of the industry's information disclosure.

Exploring Investment Optimization and “Greenwashing” from ESG Disclosure: A Dual Examination of Investor Perception

This study investigates the intricate correlation between environmental, social, and governance (ESG) information and the financial performance of companies, with a focus on the fundamental nature of ESG and its influence on the choices made by investors. This study examines available literature and data analysis to uncover how disclosing ESG information impacts investment optimization. Additionally, it clarifies the relationship between greenwashing and the advancement of green financial products. The study employs the XGBoost ensemble learning method, using non-financial features of ESG combined with financial features to construct a prediction model, achieving a prediction accuracy rate of 71.26%. Furthermore, applying this model aims to further utilize it in stock selection and constructing a stock pool. By analyzing the financial performance of companies predicted by the model, we will select potential high-performance stocks to build an investment portfolio. Then, we use the Markowitz portfolio theory to optimize the weight combination of stocks in the pool to maximize expected returns and minimize risk. After backtesting the investment portfolio using the closing prices in 2021, its annualized return was a positive 5.76%, significantly higher than the benchmark portfolio. Additionally, this study provides theoretical references and practical guidance for insight and addressing the potential large-scale greenwashing behavior under the trend of increasing ESG information disclosure in the future.

Comparative analysis of residential building decarbonization policies in major economies: insights from the EU, China, and India

The global building sector, responsible for over 30% of CO2 emissions, necessitates urgent decarbonization efforts. This paper examines residential building decarbonization policies in three major economies—the European Union (EU), China, and India. It provides an overview of diverse policies through policy landscape analysis and delves into the design specifics with a detailed policy intensity analysis of building energy codes, information disclosure, and financial incentives in each region. Our findings reveal a diverse mix of policies targeting residential building decarbonization in all three regions. While the EU and China have long-established diverse policy instruments, India's building energy efficiency policies are relatively recent and limited. Detailed analyses of building energy codes, information disclosure, and financial incentives expose variations in ambition, scope, and implementation, even with shared policy instruments. Significant advancements in building energy codes, particularly in stringency and compliance checks, are evident in the EU and China. Conversely, India faces a notable obstacle with limited adoption of residential building energy codes, impacting its journey towards net-zero. The EU leads in building energy labelling policies, while China and India encounter various challenges hindering widespread implementation. Financial incentives across the three regions predominantly take the form of subsidies, potentially straining public budgets. The study concludes with reflections on the pressing need for future research extending beyond the operational phase of buildings.

Sensory, emotional, and appropriateness of plant- and meat-based burgers.

The plant-based meat alternative market is experiencing rapid growth. However, whether this growth extends to mainstream consumers will depend on the sensory profile, emotional profile, and situational appropriateness of these products. This study provides a sensory comparison between two plant-based burgers, one hybrid burger, and a conventional 100% ground beef burger. The sensory evaluation was carried out under blind and informed conditions using a between-subject design. Participants (n=177) were asked to rate the appearance, flavor, odor, and texture of each product and indicate their overall liking. In addition, 26 sensory terms were evaluated using the rate-all-that-apply technique. The study also measured the emotional profile and the situational appropriateness elicited by each product using the check-all-that-apply technique. The results showed that (a) in the blind condition, there were no significant differences observed in overall liking across the four burgers; (b) the plant-based burger made with pea protein received the lowest overall liking score, and its evaluation was not positively influenced by product information disclosure; (c) providing product information influenced the perceived intensity of the attributes associated with meat; (d) discriminatory ability for emotions was higher in the informed condition; and (e) for the situational appropriateness, when prioritizing healthy eating, participants considered plant-based burgers more suitable than the groundbeef burger. PRACTICAL APPLICATION: Our results demonstrate that product descriptions could have an impact on consumer acceptance of different meat burger alternatives. In order to launch successfull meat alternatives, product developers and communication marketing specialists should consider the extent to which these alternatives resemble regular meat products in terms of their sensory and emotional profiles and context of use.

Self‐media information disclosure and firm productivity

AbstractUsing Sina Weibo data obtained through crawler technologies from 2013 to 2021, this study investigates the relationship between self‐media information disclosure and firm productivity. We find that self‐media information disclosure promotes firm productivity, a conclusion that withstands various robustness and endogeneity tests. Particularly, original microblogs exhibit a more significant impact. Further analysis reveals that the promoting effect is more pronounced in listed companies with lower annual retweets, small companies, and those with lower turnover. Finally, a mechanism analysis indicates that self‐media information disclosure enhances enterprise productivity by alleviating financing constraints, enhancing corporate innovation, and strengthening corporate governance.

The uninformed budge yet the misinformed buck: performance information and citizen satisfaction

ABSTRACT This article examines the impact of performance information on citizen satisfaction in the context of an environmental information disclosure programme in the U.S. Through a survey experiment on a nationally representative sample, it finds that the impact depends on disconfirmation, which is the difference between performance information and citizens’ prior perceptions. However, the impact extends only to the uninformed, who do not have strong prior perceptions, but not to the misinformed, who confidently hold incorrect perceptions. With the misinformed consisting a large portion of the population, the findings have important implications for the use of performance information in public management.

Big data development and enterprise ESG performance: Empirical evidence from China

The development of big data has transformed the traditional production and governance models of enterprises while becoming a crucial engine for upgrading and achieving high-quality development. From the perspective of institutional and market conditions we construct a Big Data Development Index to investigate the mechanism of big data development on enterprise environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance. Our empirical and theoretical research finds that big data development has a significant and positive impact on enterprise ESG which enhances enterprise ESG performance. The underlying mechanism suggests that the mediating effects of green innovation and information disclosure are significant, as big data development improves enterprise ESG performance by promoting green innovation and enhancing the quality of information disclosure. Further, heterogeneous effects indicate the promoting effect of big data development on ESG performance of state-owned enterprises and large enterprises is more pronounced.

Digital transformation by firms and the cleanliness of China's export products

This study breaks the research chain on “firm digital transformation-trade green transformation”, focusing on the effect and mechanism in firms' digital transformation on the “cleanliness” of export products. It offers theoretical and empirical support on how to respond to demand for a green transformation in trade by firms in the context of their digital transformation. First, we reveal the mechanism in the effect of firms' digital transformation on export product cleanliness at the theoretical level by extending the Stackelberg game model and constructing a variable for product cleanliness. Second, we build an index to evaluate firms' digital transformation by matching data on A-share listed companies from 2007 to 2016 with a China Customs firm database and quantitatively analyze it with a machine learning algorithm. Combined with the measured export product cleanliness index, this mechanism is empirically tested with standardized measurement methods. Overall, we find that firms' digital transformation can significantly contribute to improvement in export product cleanliness. This finding remains robust to a series of tests and decomposition of digital transformation into various dimensions. The mechanism test found that the digital transformation of firms mainly promotes the improvement of export product cleanliness through the channels of increasing digital factor inputs, promoting green technology innovation, improving environmental management performance and achieving economies of scale. Heterogeneity analysis shows that digital transformation better facilitates the promotion of cleaner exported products from firms certified with ISO14001, whose primary export destinations are countries outside of the EU, and with high disclosure quality. Furthermore, digital transformation has a structural effect on the improvement of export product cleanliness in the context of urban disclosure of environmental information.

Data, disclosure and duties: balancing privacy and safeguarding in the context of UK university student sexual misconduct complaints

Abstract The past decade has seen a marked shift in the regulatory landscape of UK higher education. Institutions are increasingly assuming responsibility for preventing campus sexual misconduct, and are responding to its occurrence through – amongst other things – codes of (mis)conduct, consent and/or active bystander training, and improved safety and security measures. They are also required to support victim-survivors in continuing with their education, and to implement fair and robust procedures through which complaints of sexual misconduct are investigated, with sanctions available that respond proportionately to the seriousness of the behaviour and its harms. This paper examines the challenges and prospects for the success of university disciplinary processes for sexual misconduct. It focuses in particular on how to balance the potentially conflicting rights to privacy held by reporting and responding parties within proceedings, while respecting parties’ rights to equality of access to education, protection from degrading treatment, due process, and the interests of the wider campus community. More specifically, we explore three key moments where private data is engaged: (1) in the fact and details of the complaint itself; (2) in information about the parties or circumstances of the complaint that arise during the process of an investigation and/or resultant university disciplinary process; and (3) in the retention and disclosure (to reporting parties or the university community) of information regarding the outcomes of, and sanctions applied as part of, a disciplinary process. We consider whether current data protection processes – and their interpretation – are compatible with trauma-informed practice and a wider commitment to safety, equality and dignity, and reflect on the ramifications for all parties where that balance between rights or interests is not struck.

From Interpersonal Privacy to HumanTechnological Privacy: Communication Privacy Management Theory Revisited

Purpose: Communication privacy management (CPM) theory is a major theory explaining the tensions between disclosing and concealing private information in interpersonal communication. By considering differences in interpersonal and human-technology information disclosure and drawing on existing work related to privacy and technology, this article presents CPM theory as a broad theoretical framework for human-technology privacy boundary management. Method: This research employed a speculative theoretical approach by drawing on existing literature and synthesizing it to both apply and extend CPM theory’s propositions to human-technology privacy boundary management. Results: CPM theory can be applied to understand the dynamics of human-technology information disclosure and should incorporate technological literacy as a key consideration in human-technology privacy boundary management. Legal ties characterize human-technology privacy boundary coordination instead of social ties. Additionally, in human-technology information disclosure contexts, CPM theory should provide guidance regarding managing third parties that may gain access to information. Conclusion: CPM theory is the most comprehensive framework for how individuals manage privacy boundaries, be it in interpersonal or human-technology contexts. By considering technology as a property of technological actors instead of an actor itself, CPM theory in human-technology contexts becomes a flexible theoretical framework for understanding information disclosure and privacy boundary management, both for existing technologies (e.g., social media, online shopping platforms, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things) and future technologies.

Financial information, spillovers, and innovation performance

We hypothesize that high-quality financial information can, through its spillovers to peer firms’ strategic decision-making, have an adverse effect on the disclosing firm’s innovation performance. Using the degree of disaggregation in financial reports and patent-based measures to proxy for financial information quality and significance of innovative outputs, respectively, we find that the patented inventions of firms with more disaggregated financial reports are less innovative. We also document that the negative association is more pronounced for firms with more intense product market threats, a situation in which the spillover of more detailed information is costlier. We further validate our argument by documenting that disclosures of more and finer information actually help peers increase innovation activities and investments, consistent with the peers’ effective strategic responses to the disclosing firm’s innovation. Overall, the results from the cross-sectional analysis and validation tests confirm the channel through which more disaggregated financial information can lead to a decline in firm innovation performance. This study contributes to the literatures on information spillovers, economic consequences of financial reporting, proprietary costs of disclosures, and innovation.

ESG Performance, Heterogeneous Creditors, and Bond Financing Costs: Firm-Level Evidence

Exploiting credit spread to measure firm bond financing costs, this study explored the impact of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance on bond financing costs from the perspective of heterogeneous creditors. Our results revealed that national interbank bond market and qualified institutional investors are increasingly interested in aligning their capital with ESG-related investment opportunities. Thus, they require a low rate of return from firms with good ESG performance. In contrast, domestic legal and natural persons and ordinary institutional investors are unlikely to accept a low investment return in exchange for the positive impact of ESG. Additional robustness tests confirmed the results, including firm-fixed effects, variable substitution method, supplemental variable method, lagged variable approach, instrumental variable analysis, and propensity score matching. The results of mechanism analysis indicated that the bond cost reduction effect of ESG is achieved by improving firms’ information disclosure quality and reputation. In addition, because of trade-off theory and agency problems, the environmental and social factors of ESG have only a limited impact on bond cost reduction, whereas the governance factor markedly reduces bond costs.

Does the integration between litigation and supervision discipline financial misstatement?

This paper explores the positive governance effects of the Procuratorate’s Public Interest Litigation System in China, which combines the powers of litigation and administrative supervision, on the quality of information disclosure by listed state-owned enterprises. We report several findings. (1) The likelihood that listed state-owned enterprises would issue financial restatements and participate in financial fraud decreased significantly in areas selected for pilot implementation. (2) The governance effect is stronger in regulated industries than in unregulated industries. After the pilot implementation, the agency costs decreased, and the increase in legal litigation risks related to false statements faced by enterprises played a deterrent effect. (3) The significance of the above results is stronger when a company’s external and internal governance are weaker. This study provides both new evidence of the effectiveness of the integrated governance mechanism and inspiration for future efforts to widely implement this mechanism in the capital market.