To reward or not to reward? : investors' response to renewable energy investment by international oil companies

We analyse how investors respond to announcements of investment in renewable energy by international oil companies. Although the transition from oil to renewable energy is generally viewed as a positive outcome for all oil companies, our results show that market participants do not value all moves in that direction equally. More specifically, we find that investors responded positively to all announcements made by three of the seven companies studied, but showed little to no response to the announcements made by the other four companies. We attribute these findings to country-specific factors which influence investors' expectations and responses to such announcements.