IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/reaccs/v30y2025i2d10.1007_s11142-024-09856-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

ESG assurance in the United States

Author

Listed:
  • Brandon Gipper

    (Stanford University Graduate School of Business)

  • Samantha Ross

    (University of California College of the Law)

  • Shawn X. Shi

    (University of Washington Michael G. Foster School of Business)

Abstract

We provide the first large-sample evidence on third-party verification of firms’ environmental and social metrics in ESG reports (ESG assurance) in the United States. Focusing on the S&P 500 from 2010–2020, we document a striking increase in not only the number of firms with ESG assurance—in 2020 (2010), 76% (38%) of the S&P 500 had an ESG report and 46% (16%) involved assurance—but also the number of metrics assured. Unlike financial audits, ESG assurance varies widely in form and substance, including the choice of metrics assured, the level of assurance, and assuror identity. We show that firms’ decision to obtain ESG assurance is primarily driven by their adoption of ESG reporting frameworks and peer effects, with firm characteristics documented in prior literature playing only a minor role. Assurance is associated with improvements in ESG disclosure, ESG ratings, and the number of institutional investors holding the firm’s stock.

Suggested Citation

  • Brandon Gipper & Samantha Ross & Shawn X. Shi, 2025. "ESG assurance in the United States," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 30(2), pages 1753-1803, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:reaccs:v:30:y:2025:i:2:d:10.1007_s11142-024-09856-2
    DOI: 10.1007/s11142-024-09856-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11142-024-09856-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11142-024-09856-2?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Samuel M. Hartzmark & Abigail B. Sussman, 2019. "Do Investors Value Sustainability? A Natural Experiment Examining Ranking and Fund Flows," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 74(6), pages 2789-2837, December.
    2. Palmrose, Zv, 1986. "The Effect Of Nonaudit Services On The Pricing Of Audit Services - Further Evidence," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(2), pages 405-411.
    3. Kausar, Asad & Shroff, Nemit & White, Hal, 2016. "Real effects of the audit choice," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(1), pages 157-181.
    4. Mikko Zerni, 2012. "Audit Partner Specialization and Audit Fees: Some Evidence from Sweden," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 29(1), pages 312-340, March.
    5. Seo, Hojun, 2021. "Peer effects in corporate disclosure decisions," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1).
    6. Okeefe, Tb & Simunic, Da & Stein, Mt, 1994. "The Production Of Audit Services - Evidence From A Major Public Accounting Firm," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(2), pages 241-261.
    7. Michael Minnis, 2011. "The Value of Financial Statement Verification in Debt Financing: Evidence from Private U.S. Firms," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(2), pages 457-506, May.
    8. Cohen, Shira & Kadach, Igor & Ormazabal, Gaizka, 2023. "Institutional investors, climate disclosure, and carbon emissions," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(2).
    9. Thomas Bourveau & Janja Brendel & Jordan Schoenfeld, 2024. "Decentralized Finance (DeFi) assurance: early evidence," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 29(3), pages 2209-2253, September.
    10. Charles F. Manski, 1993. "Identification of Endogenous Social Effects: The Reflection Problem," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 60(3), pages 531-542.
    11. Gipper, Brandon, 2021. "The economic effects of expanded compensation disclosures," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1).
    12. Watts, Ross L & Zimmerman, Jerold L, 1983. "Agency Problems, Auditing, and the Theory of the Firm: Some Evidence," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 26(3), pages 613-633, October.
    13. DeFond, Mark L. & Lennox, Clive S., 2011. "The effect of SOX on small auditor exits and audit quality," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(1), pages 21-40, June.
    14. Jordan Schoenfeld, 2024. "Cyber risk and voluntary Service Organization Control (SOC) audits," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 29(1), pages 580-620, March.
    15. Giovanna Michelon & Dennis M. Patten & Andrea M. Romi, 2019. "Creating Legitimacy for Sustainability Assurance Practices: Evidence from Sustainability Restatements," European Accounting Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 28(2), pages 395-422, March.
    16. Brandon Gipper & Christian Leuz & Mark Maffett, 2020. "Public Oversight and Reporting Credibility: Evidence from the PCAOB Audit Inspection Regime," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 33(10), pages 4532-4579.
    17. DeFond, Mark & Zhang, Jieying, 2014. "A review of archival auditing research," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(2), pages 275-326.
    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. DeFond, Mark & Zhang, Jieying, 2014. "A review of archival auditing research," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(2), pages 275-326.
    2. Hans B. Christensen & Luzi Hail & Christian Leuz, 2021. "Mandatory CSR and sustainability reporting: economic analysis and literature review," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 26(3), pages 1176-1248, September.
    3. Liangliang Jiang & Hui Zhou, 2017. "The role of audit verification in debt contracting: evidence from covenant violations," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 22(1), pages 469-501, March.
    4. Brandon Gipper & Christian Leuz & Mark Maffett, 2015. "Public Audit Oversight and Reporting Credibility: Evidence from the PCAOB Inspection Regime," NBER Working Papers 21530, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Jordan Schoenfeld, 2024. "Cyber risk and voluntary Service Organization Control (SOC) audits," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 29(1), pages 580-620, March.
    6. Mihai Carp & Costel Istrate, 2021. "Audit Quality under Influences of Audit Firm and Auditee Characteristics: Evidence from the Romanian Regulated Market," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(12), pages 1-16, June.
    7. Kausar, Asad & Shroff, Nemit & White, Hal, 2016. "Real effects of the audit choice," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(1), pages 157-181.
    8. Pan, Yue & Shroff, Nemit & Zhang, Pengdong, 2023. "The dark side of audit market competition," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(1).
    9. Ormazabal, Gaizka, 2018. "The Role of Stakeholders in Corporate Governance: A View from Accounting Research," CEPR Discussion Papers 12775, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    10. Ann Vanstraelen & Caren Schelleman, 2017. "Auditing private companies: what do we know?," Accounting and Business Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(5), pages 565-584, July.
    11. Christensen, Brant E. & Newton, Nathan J. & Wilkins, Michael S., 2021. "How do team workloads and team staffing affect the audit? Archival evidence from U.S. audits," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    12. Knechel, W. Robert & Thomas, Edward & Driskill, Matthew, 2020. "Understanding financial auditing from a service perspective," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    13. Michael Minnis & Nemit Shroff, 2017. "Why regulate private firm disclosure and auditing?," Accounting and Business Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(5), pages 473-502, July.
    14. Matthias Breuer, 2021. "How Does Financial‐Reporting Regulation Affect Industry‐Wide Resource Allocation?," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 59(1), pages 59-110, March.
    15. Chy, Mahfuz & De Franco, Gus & Su, Barbara, 2021. "The effect of auditor litigation risk on clients' access to bank debt: Evidence from a quasi-experiment," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1).
    16. Elina Haapamäki, 2018. "Voluntary Auditing: A Synthesis of the Literature," Accounting in Europe, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(1), pages 81-104, January.
    17. Raphael Duguay & Michael Minnis & Andrew Sutherland, 2020. "Regulatory Spillovers in Common Audit Markets," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(8), pages 3389-3411, August.
    18. Rustam, Sehrish & Rashid, Kashif & Zaman, Khalid, 2013. "The relationship between audit committees, compensation incentives and corporate audit fees in Pakistan," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 697-716.
    19. Wu, Bin & Wu, Yaqian & Zhang, Min & Li, Jiyuan, 2024. "Opening the black box of human resource allocations in audit firms: The assignment of audit partners to audit engagements," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(2).
    20. Xingqiang Du & Liang Xiao & Yingjie Du, 2023. "Does CEO–Auditor Dialect Connectedness Trigger Audit Opinion Shopping? Evidence from China," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 184(2), pages 391-426, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ESG reporting; ESG assurance; Auditing; Sustainability;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G18 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • G30 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - General
    • M14 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - Corporate Culture; Diversity; Social Responsibility
    • M41 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Accounting - - - Accounting
    • M42 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Accounting - - - Auditing

    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:spr:reaccs:v:30:y:2025:i:2:d:10.1007_s11142-024-09856-2. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.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.