IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v17y2025i15p6790-d1710254.html

An Analysis of the Relationship Between ESG Activities and the Financial Performance of Japanese Companies Toward Sustainable Development

Author

Listed:
  • Takafumi Ikuta

    (Graduate School of Economics, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 819-0395, Japan)

  • Hidemichi Fujii

    (Faculty of Economics, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 819-0395, Japan)

Abstract

Demands for companies to comply with environmental, social, and governance (ESG) requirements are growing, and companies are also expected to play a role in promoting sustainable development. For companies to achieve sustainable growth while addressing ESG, it must be understood whether ESG activities promote improved corporate financial performance. We conducted a five-year panel data analysis of 635 Japanese firms from FY 2019 to FY 2023, using the PBR, PER, and ROE financial indicators as the dependent variables and CSR ratings in the human resource utilization (HR), environment (E), governance (G), and social (S) categories as the independent variables. The results revealed that, depending on the combination of ESG field and financial indicators, companies with advanced ESG initiatives had greater financial performance, with some cases showing a nonlinear relationship; differences in the results between manufacturing and nonmanufacturing industries were also observed. For companies to effectively advance ESG activities, it is important to clarify the objectives and results for each ESG category. For policymakers to consider measures to encourage companies’ ESG activities, it is also important to design finely tuned regulations and incentives according to the ESG category and industry characteristics.

Suggested Citation

  • Takafumi Ikuta & Hidemichi Fujii, 2025. "An Analysis of the Relationship Between ESG Activities and the Financial Performance of Japanese Companies Toward Sustainable Development," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(15), pages 1-23, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:15:p:6790-:d:1710254
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/15/6790/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/15/6790/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lingfu Kong & Minhas Akbar & Petra Poulova, 2023. "The Role of Environment, Social, and Governance Performance in Shaping Corporate Current and Future Value: The Case of Global Tech Leaders," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(17), pages 1-14, August.
    2. Manuel Branco & Lúcia Rodrigues, 2006. "Corporate Social Responsibility and Resource-Based Perspectives," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 69(2), pages 111-132, December.
    3. Hoje Jo & Maretno Harjoto, 2012. "The Causal Effect of Corporate Governance on Corporate Social Responsibility," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 106(1), pages 53-72, March.
    4. Kelvin Lee Yong Ming & Yamunah Vaicondam & Amira Mas Ayu Amir Mustafa & Siti Nurul Munawwarah Roslan & Shen Yi & Komal Chopra & Pooja Khanna, 2024. "ESG Integration and Financial Performance: Evidence from Malaysia’s Leading Companies," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 14(5), pages 487-494, September.
    5. Ethan Rouen & George Serafeim, 2021. "Impact-Weighted Financial Accounts: A Paradigm Shift," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 22(03), pages 20-25, May.
    6. Jun Xie & Wataru Nozawa & Michiyuki Yagi & Hidemichi Fujii & Shunsuke Managi, 2019. "Do environmental, social, and governance activities improve corporate financial performance?," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(2), pages 286-300, February.
    7. David J. Teece, 2007. "Explicating dynamic capabilities: the nature and microfoundations of (sustainable) enterprise performance," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(13), pages 1319-1350, December.
    8. Takafumi Ikuta & Hidemichi Fujii, 2022. "An Analysis of the Progress of Japanese Companies’ Commitment to the SDGs and Their Economic Systems and Social Activities for Communities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(8), pages 1-17, April.
    9. Doğan, Murat & Sayılır, Özlem & Komath, Muhammed Aslam Chelery & Çimen, Emre, 2025. "Prediction of market value of firms with corporate sustainability performance data using machine learning models," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Francesco Gangi & Lucia Michela Daniele & Nicola Varrone, 2020. "How do corporate environmental policy and corporate reputation affect risk‐adjusted financial performance?," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(5), pages 1975-1991, July.
    2. Fereshteh Mahmoudian & Johnny Jermias, 2022. "The influence of governance structure on the relationship between pay ratio and environmental and social performance," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(7), pages 2992-3013, November.
    3. Francesco Gangi & Antonio Meles & Eugenio D'Angelo & Lucia Michela Daniele, 2019. "Sustainable development and corporate governance in the financial system: Are environmentally friendly banks less risky?," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 26(3), pages 529-547, May.
    4. Joel T. Harper & Li Sun, 2025. "Asset redeployability and corporate social responsibility," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 64(4), pages 1595-1631, May.
    5. Wenbin Sun & Shanji Yao & Rahul Govind, 2019. "Reexamining Corporate Social Responsibility and Shareholder Value: The Inverted-U-Shaped Relationship and the Moderation of Marketing Capability," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 160(4), pages 1001-1017, December.
    6. Zhaoyang Guo & Siyu Hou & Qingchang Li, 2020. "Corporate Social Responsibility and Firm Value: The Moderating Effects of Financial Flexibility and R&D Investment," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(20), pages 1-17, October.
    7. Li, WeiWei & Padmanabhan, Prasad & Huang, Chia-Hsing, 2024. "ESG and debt structure: Is the nature of this relationship nonlinear?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    8. Sara Walton & Annie Zhang & Conor O'Kane, 2020. "Energy eco‐innovations for sustainable development: Exploring organizational strategic capabilities through an energy cultures framework," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(3), pages 812-826, March.
    9. Ibrahim Khalifa Elmghaamez & Jacinta Nwachukwu & Collins G. Ntim, 2024. "ESG disclosure and financial performance of multinational enterprises: The moderating effect of board standing committees," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(3), pages 3593-3638, July.
    10. Picheng Lee & Gary Kleinman & Asokan Anandarajan, 2025. "The effect of tournament incentives on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance," International Journal of Disclosure and Governance, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 22(2), pages 397-408, June.
    11. Siddique, Md Abubakar & Akhtaruzzaman, Md & Rashid, Afzalur & Hammami, Helmi, 2021. "Carbon disclosure, carbon performance and financial performance: International evidence," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    12. Gangi, Francesco & Meles, Antonio & Monferrà, Stefano & Mustilli, Mario, 2020. "Does corporate social responsibility help the survivorship of SMEs and large firms?," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 43(C).
    13. Stefano Dell'Atti & Annarita Trotta & Antonia Patrizia Iannuzzi & Federica Demaria, 2017. "Corporate Social Responsibility Engagement as a Determinant of Bank Reputation: An Empirical Analysis," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 24(6), pages 589-605, November.
    14. Maria Celia López-Penabad & Ana Iglesias-Casal & José Fernando Silva Neto & José Manuel Maside-Sanfiz, 2023. "Does corporate social performance improve bank efficiency? Evidence from European banks," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 17(4), pages 1399-1437, May.
    15. Thi Ngan Pham & Phung Phi Tran & Minh-Hieu Le & Hoang Nhi Vo & Cong Dat Pham & Hai-Dang Nguyen, 2022. "The Effects of ESG Combined Score on Business Performance of Enterprises in the Transportation Industry," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(14), pages 1-17, July.
    16. Ajab Khan & H. Kent Baker, 2022. "How board diversity and ownership structure shape sustainable corporate performance," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(8), pages 3751-3770, December.
    17. Pascal Ricordel & Melinda Majláth, 2025. "Imperfect information and the reputational proximity spillovers issue in the product-related CSR–CFP relationship: A study of 125 major listed European companies from 2010 to 2018," Post-Print hal-05354594, HAL.
    18. Ahmed Saber Moussa & Mahmoud Elmarzouky & Doaa Shohaieb, 2024. "Green Governance: How ESG Initiatives Drive Financial Performance in UK Firms?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(24), pages 1-25, December.
    19. Jaime Guerrero-Villegas & Leticia Pérez-Calero & José Manuel Hurtado-González & Pilar Giráldez-Puig, 2018. "Board Attributes and Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosure: A Meta-Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(12), pages 1-22, December.
    20. Tao, Yunqing & Wang, Dianjie & Ye, Yongwei & Wu, Haitao & Zhang, Yao, 2023. "The role of public environmental concern on corporate social responsibility: Evidence from search index of web users," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    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:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:15:p:6790-:d:1710254. 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: MDPI Indexing Manager The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask MDPI Indexing Manager to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    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.