Institutional Ownership and Value Relevance of Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosure: Empirical Evidence from China

We examine the relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure and firm value in China. Using a sample of listed companies on the Shanghai Stock Exchange from 2008 to 2012, we find that market value of a firm is higher when a company makes a lower level of CSR disclosure. Other...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ramiz ur Rehman, Zahid Riaz, Charles Cullinan, Junrui Zhang, Fanghua Wang
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2020-03-01
Series:Sustainability
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/6/2311
Description
Summary:We examine the relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure and firm value in China. Using a sample of listed companies on the Shanghai Stock Exchange from 2008 to 2012, we find that market value of a firm is higher when a company makes a lower level of CSR disclosure. Other things being equal, this relationship becomes positive when the CSR disclosure is moderated with the institutional ownership. With regard to the CSR disclosure, we found consistent results with respect to the little evidence that the <i>amount</i> of CSR disclosure is significantly associated with market value among those companies who chose to provide CSR disclosures. Taken together, these results indicate that the decision to disclose or not to disclose CSR information is value relevant to the level of institutional investors. These findings are important as they have made an attempt to resolve the earlier contradictory findings with respect to the relationship between market value and CSR disclosure. Furthermore, it has highlighted the value relevance of CSR disclosure regarding the type of shareholders/institutional investors.
ISSN:2071-1050