This paper explores the effectiveness of the voluntary reform. It studies a voluntary healthcare reform that was implemented in Ireland in 2008. The analysis is conducted using a theoretical model and empirical evidence. In 2008, in the hope to reduce waiting lists, new contracts were issued...

This paper deals with trade platforms whose operators not only allow third party sellers to offer their products to consumers, but also offer products themselves. In this context, the platform operator faces a hold-up problem if he uses classical twopart tariffs only as potential competition...

We investigate whether the sustainability implications of firms’ innovative pursuits are associated with their disclosure choices. We find that firms with a greater percentage of patents granted in environmentally sound technologies provide more innovation disclosure in conference calls...

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between managers' ability and voluntary disclosure of carbon emissions and whether industry competition affects those relationships. Using Korean firms listed on the Korean stock market from 2008 to 2019, we find that high-ability managers...

Integrated reporting is essentially a voluntary practice worldwide. For this reason, although it is growing, its diffusion is slow. Based on the Portuguese context, where a reduced number of listed companies publish integrated reports, this study aims to explore the drivers and barriers for the...

Analyzing the intricate financial dimensions of multi-segment conglomerates necessitates a more nuanced approach than that required for single-segment firms. We find that conglomerates compensate for their business complexity by strategically disclosing more information voluntarily. This finding...

Institutional investors have limited resources dedicated to engagement activities, yet, in manycases they hold thousands of stocks in their portfolios. We exploit the introduction of the tieringclassification system by the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) in 2016 for signatories reportingunder...

The aim of this chapter is to inform reflection on business self-regulation (or corporate social responsibility, ‘CSR’) in addressing climate change by drawing on developments in ‘business and human rights’ and the experience accumulated in the EU. Despite dissimilarities in addressing...

We study whether the threat of exit by institutional investors can induce firms to voluntarily disclose their environmental policies. To address concerns about reverse causality and omitted variables, we implement a fuzzy regression discontinuity design to conduct our empirical tests. The...

Besides hostile intervention, activist shareholders aiming to make changes in target firmsalso use more friendly approaches such as communicating with the firm management. Managerscan strategically influence activist shareholders’ perception about the firm and therefore theirchoice of...

The environment governance in China is a hybrid of mandatory and voluntary regulations in implementation and enforcement. This paper aims to explore how voluntary environment regulations (VERs) such as ISO14001 certification affect corporate green innovation (CGI) and the role of mandatory...

Loot boxes in video games are a form of in-game transactions with randomized elements. Concerns have been raised about loot boxes' similarities with gambling and their potential harms (e.g. overspending). Recognizing players' and parents' concerns, in mid-2020, the Entertainment Software Rating...

Rice cultivation in Sub-Saharan Africa produces a negative externality in the form of higher malaria risk. Larval source management, such as the application of bio-larvicides in rice fields, is available to mitigate the problem. However, the cost of larvicide and the corresponding spraying...

Previous scholars have noted the increase in negotiated agreements as a means of resolving utility regulatory disputes in the United States. These agreements allow policy actors to make their own decisions instead of receiving orders from a regulatory agency. Through a natural gas utility case...

This study aims to examine the trends in the sustainability performance indicators disclosed in sustainability reports by Canadian companies. Our sample is comprised of eight companies in four sectors and our observations cover a 19-year period. The results of our analysis show a general...

Recent changes in national competition laws and enforcement guidelines, including those of the European Commission, increase the scope for considering sustainability benefits in the assessment of horizontal cooperations. Abstracting from (standard) arguments that relate to cost sharing,...

Voluntary standards have become a promising mode of governance to promote sustainable production and consumption in global value chains. Despite a growing number of studies on consumers' preferences for sustainable products, insufficient attention has been paid to the heterogeneity of existing...

“Energy-Saving and Low-Carbon Action Implementation Plan for Ten Thousand Enterprises” urged the Chinese energy users to establish an energy management system(EEM) that emphasizes energy conservation and emission reduction. This study applied the voluntary information disclosure theory,...

Climate change is the biggest threat humankind is facing nowadays. More greenhouse gases (GHG) have been released into the atmosphere in the last 30 years than in the entire history of our planet, causing average temperatures to rise by about one degree Celsius thus far. If this continues, 50...

We study voluntary disclosure strategies in leader-follower games where firms choose real actions sequentially after simultaneously disclosing information. We show that the leader incurs an endogenous consistency cost when withholding information because it must choose a suboptimal real action...

Beyond their legal obligations, corporations globally are considering human rights issues in their management policies and practices for their responsible business conduct regarding social sustainability. This rationale applies to corporate responsibility, in which corporations are active...

Standard-setting organizations (SSOs) typically require their members to declare whether they hold standard-essential patents (SEPs) or disclose which SEPs they own, and to commit to licensing SEPs on “fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory” (FRAND) terms. The apparent vagueness of FRAND...

In this paper, we examine factors prompting companies to voluntarily adopt sustainability standards for sustainability reporting and the consequences of such voluntary commitment. Using data on firms’ voluntary adoption of sustainability standards developed by the Sustainability Accounting...

This paper hypothesizes that if an earnings announcement fails to resolve uncertainty about the firm’s future outcomes, then management will take steps to further inform investors. The novelty of our approach consists of our empirical proxy for unresolved uncertainty, constructed using a...

This article analyzes the disclosure of the liability insurance coverage limit and the impact of mandating disclosure of the coverage limit in a setting where voluntary disclosure of a firm's cash flow information is subject to litigation risk and the firm has directors' and officers' (D\&O)...

This study investigates whether and how voluntary disclosure affects the earnings announcement premium (EAP). Using S&P500 index additions as an exogenous source of variation to voluntary disclosures, we test the effect of guidance on information risk and investor attention as drivers of the...

This research aims to identify voluntary disclosure indices and components as well as the impact of corporate governance system on information asymmetry. This research is archival survey. In terms of survey research dimension, the statistic population, the accounting and finance’s experts’...