IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hhb/sicgwp/2008_002.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Industry Risk Moderates the Relation between Environmental and Financial Performance

Author

Listed:

Abstract

This study extends previous research on the relation between different measures of environmental and financial performance by introducing moderating effects of inherent environmental industry risk. We provide empirical evidence from the MSCI World Index U.S. companies by using the GES Investment Services® risk rating for the period 2003-2006. The inherent environmental industry risk has a significant moderating effect on the form of the relation between environmental preparedness/performance and operating performance of the companies. In high risk or polluting industries, environmental management is costly and reduces the operating performance of companies. In low risk sectors, such as banking and insurance, leading companies on environmental management are also more profitable. The paper makes a distinction between the reputational benefits of environmental preparedness and the operational gains of environmental performance when studying the effects on market value. A significant direct effect of environmental preparedness on the market value of the companies is present, while the relation between environmental performance and market value is stronger in low risk industries than in high risk industries. In low risk industries, the market value of the companies is also on average higher and more attuned to benefits to environmental performance than in high risk industries.

Suggested Citation

  • Semenova, Natalia & Hassel, Lars, 2008. "Industry Risk Moderates the Relation between Environmental and Financial Performance," Sustainable Investment and Corporate Governance Working Papers 2008/2, Sustainable Investment Research Platform.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhb:sicgwp:2008_002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://web.abo.fi/fak/esf/fei/redovisa/kurser/Lasse/Mistra%20wp/sirp%20wp%2008-02%20Semenova%20and%20Hassel.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lars Hassel & Henrik Nilsson & Siv Nyquist, 2005. "The value relevance of environmental performance," European Accounting Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 14(1), pages 41-61.
    2. Shameek Konar & Mark A. Cohen, 2001. "Does The Market Value Environmental Performance?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 83(2), pages 281-289, May.
    3. Heinkel, Robert & Kraus, Alan & Zechner, Josef, 2001. "The Effect of Green Investment on Corporate Behavior," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 36(4), pages 431-449, December.
    4. Barber, Brad M. & Lyon, John D., 1996. "Detecting abnormal operating performance: The empirical power and specification of test statistics," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(3), pages 359-399, July.
    5. Lundgren, Tommy, 2007. "On the Economics of Corporate Responsibility," Sustainable Investment and Corporate Governance Working Papers 2007/3, Sustainable Investment Research Platform.
    6. Alessandri, Todd M. & Khan, Raihan H., 2006. "Market performance and deviance from industry norms: (Mis)alignment of organizational risk and industry risk," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 59(10-11), pages 1105-1115, October.
    7. Adam B. Jaffe et al., 1995. "Environmental Regulation and the Competitiveness of U.S. Manufacturing: What Does the Evidence Tell Us?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 33(1), pages 132-163, March.
    8. Mitchell A. Petersen, 2009. "Estimating Standard Errors in Finance Panel Data Sets: Comparing Approaches," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(1), pages 435-480, January.
    9. Andrew A. King & Michael J. Lenox, 2001. "Does It Really Pay to Be Green? An Empirical Study of Firm Environmental and Financial Performance: An Empirical Study of Firm Environmental and Financial Performance," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 5(1), pages 105-116, January.
    10. Andrew King & Michael Lenox, 2002. "Exploring the Locus of Profitable Pollution Reduction," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 48(2), pages 289-299, February.
    11. Natalia Semenova & Lars G. Hassel, 2008. "Financial outcomes of environmental risk and opportunity for US companies," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 16(3), pages 195-212.
    12. Karpoff, Jonathan M & Lott, John R, Jr & Wehrly, Eric W, 2005. "The Reputational Penalties for Environmental Violations: Empirical Evidence," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 48(2), pages 653-675, October.
    13. Herremans, Irene M. & Akathaporn, Parporn & McInnes, Morris, 1993. "An investigation of corporate social responsibility reputation and economic performance," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 18(7-8), pages 587-604.
    14. Hamilton James T., 1995. "Pollution as News: Media and Stock Market Reactions to the Toxics Release Inventory Data," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 98-113, January.
    15. Glen Dowell & Stuart Hart & Bernard Yeung, 2000. "Do Corporate Global Environmental Standards Create or Destroy Market Value?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 46(8), pages 1059-1074, August.
    16. Hong, Harrison & Kacperczyk, Marcin, 2009. "The price of sin: The effects of social norms on markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 15-36, July.
    17. Stuart L. Hart & Gautam Ahuja, 1996. "Does It Pay To Be Green? An Empirical Examination Of The Relationship Between Emission Reduction And Firm Performance," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 5(1), pages 30-37, March.
    18. Cameron,A. Colin & Trivedi,Pravin K., 2005. "Microeconometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521848053.
    19. Elsayed, Khaled & Paton, David, 2005. "The impact of environmental performance on firm performance: static and dynamic panel data evidence," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 395-412, September.
    20. Robert D. Klassen & Curtis P. McLaughlin, 1996. "The Impact of Environmental Management on Firm Performance," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 42(8), pages 1199-1214, August.
    21. Hartmann, Frank G. H. & Moers, Frank, 1999. "Testing contingency hypotheses in budgetary research: an evaluation of the use of moderated regression analysis," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 291-315, May.
    22. Steven N. Kaplan & Luigi Zingales, 1997. "Do Investment-Cash Flow Sensitivities Provide Useful Measures of Financing Constraints?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(1), pages 169-215.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zerbib, Olivier David, 2019. "The effect of pro-environmental preferences on bond prices: Evidence from green bonds," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 39-60.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Stefan Ambec & Paul Lanoie, 2007. "When and Why Does It Pay To Be Green?," CIRANO Working Papers 2007s-20, CIRANO.
    2. Urs von Arx & Andreas Ziegler, 2008. "The Effect of CSR on Stock Performance: New Evidence for the USA and Europe," CER-ETH Economics working paper series 08/85, CER-ETH - Center of Economic Research (CER-ETH) at ETH Zurich.
    3. Justin Hung Nguyen, 2018. "Carbon risk and firm performance: Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment," Australian Journal of Management, Australian School of Business, vol. 43(1), pages 65-90, February.
    4. Markus Hang & Jerome Geyer‐Klingeberg & Andreas W. Rathgeber, 2019. "It is merely a matter of time: A meta‐analysis of the causality between environmental performance and financial performance," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(2), pages 257-273, February.
    5. Stephen Bahadar & Muhammad Nadeem & Rashid Zaman, 2023. "Toxic chemical releases and idiosyncratic return volatility: A prospect theory perspective," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 63(2), pages 2109-2143, June.
    6. Suhong Li & Thomas Ngniatedema & Fang Chen, 2017. "Understanding the Impact of Green Initiatives and Green Performance on Financial Performance in the US," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(6), pages 776-790, September.
    7. Fisher-Vanden, Karen & Thorburn, Karin S., 2011. "Voluntary corporate environmental initiatives and shareholder wealth," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 62(3), pages 430-445.
    8. Surender Kumar & Pritika Dua, 2022. "Environmental management practices and financial performance: evidence from large listed Indian enterprises," Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 65(1), pages 37-61, January.
    9. Andreas Ziegler, 2012. "Is it Beneficial to be Included in a Sustainability Stock Index? A Panel Data Study for European Firms," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 52(3), pages 301-325, July.
    10. Michael Dobler & Kaouthar Lajili & Daniel Zéghal, 2014. "Environmental Performance, Environmental Risk and Risk Management," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(1), pages 1-17, January.
    11. Dam, Lammertjan & Scholtens, Bert, 2015. "Toward a theory of responsible investing: On the economic foundations of corporate social responsibility," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 103-121.
    12. Semenova, Natalia, 2010. "Corporate Environmental Performance: Consistency of Metrics and Identification of Drivers," Sustainable Investment and Corporate Governance Working Papers 2010/9, Sustainable Investment Research Platform.
    13. Nadja Guenster & Rob Bauer & Jeroen Derwall & Kees Koedijk, 2011. "The Economic Value of Corporate Eco†Efficiency," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 17(4), pages 679-704, September.
    14. Natalia Semenova & Lars G. Hassel, 2008. "Financial outcomes of environmental risk and opportunity for US companies," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 16(3), pages 195-212.
    15. Eng, Li Li & Fikru, Mahelet G. & Vichitsarawong, Thanyaluk, 2021. "The impact of toxic chemical releases and their management on financial performance," Advances in accounting, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    16. Oberndorfer, Ulrich & Schmidt, Peter & Wagner, Marcus & Ziegler, Andreas, 2013. "Does the stock market value the inclusion in a sustainability stock index? An event study analysis for German firms," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 66(3), pages 497-509.
    17. Hammad Riaz & Abubakr Saeed, 2020. "Impact of environmental policy on firm's market performance: The case of ISO 14001," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 27(2), pages 681-693, March.
    18. Joaquín Cañón-de-Francia & Concepción Garcés-Ayerbe, 2009. "ISO 14001 Environmental Certification: A Sign Valued by the Market?," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 44(2), pages 245-262, October.
    19. Elsayed, Khaled & Paton, David, 2005. "The impact of environmental performance on firm performance: static and dynamic panel data evidence," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 395-412, September.
    20. Noor Muhammad & Frank Scrimgeour & Krishna Reddy & Sazali Abidin, 2015. "The Impact of Corporate Environmental Performance on Market Risk: The Australian Industry Case," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 132(2), pages 347-362, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Environmental risk and opportunity; financial performance; return on assets; Tobin’s Q; panel data analysis;
    All these keywords.

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hhb:sicgwp:2008_002. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Pontus Cerin (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iikthse.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.