Does board independence moderate the relationship between environmental disclosure quality and performance? Evidence from static and dynamic panel data

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 580-610 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammad Alipour ◽  
Mehrdad Ghanbari ◽  
Babak Jamshidinavid ◽  
Aliasghar Taherabadi

PurposeThis study aims to link environmental disclosure quality (EDQ) to firm performance and examine the moderating role of board independence in this relationship.Design/methodology/approachDrawing on agency theory and stakeholder theory, the authors developed and tested hypotheses using original survey data from 720 firm-year observations collected from 120 Iranian companies over six years between 2011 and 2016. In this paper, they conducted static and dynamic panel data analysis.FindingsAfter correcting for endogeneity bias, the results showed that there is a significant positive relationship between EDQ and firm performance. The results also showed that board independence significantly reinforces the positive effect of EDQ on performance, and firms with more independent board members are involved environmental disclosure for improved performance. This is consistent with agency theory, which posits that a more independent board of directors can better monitor the CEO and reduce incentives for pursuing personal interests, which in turn improves performance. The results are robust after performing sensitivity tests.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper takes the perspective of corporate governance to empirically examine the effect of EDQ on firm performance. This study makes a contribution to the literature by showing that board independence moderates the effects of EDQ on firm performance.Practical implicationsThe evidence supports the emphasis that recent policy statements have put on increasing the number of independent directors on corporate boards. This study offers insights to policymakers interested in enhancing the monitoring role of corporate boards.Originality/valueThe study adds value to the understanding of the effect of the EDQ on performance and how board independence influences this relationship, particularly in an emerging economy like Iran.

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiunn-Shyan Khong ◽  
Chee-Wooi Hooy ◽  
Chun-Teck Lye

PurposeThis study investigates the effect of board independence on private information-based trading (PIBT) events. This study also examines the interaction effects of firm's disclosure quality and the statutory and demographic roles of independent directors and board diversity attributes, respectively, on the relationship between board independence and PIBT.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses panel data of 811 non-financial public listed companies in Bursa Malaysia for the sample period 2009–2017. The dynamic general method of moments (DGMM) is used for the dynamic panel data estimation and to address the potential endogeneity problem.FindingsThe results show that board independence has a negative effect on PIBT and the effect could be strengthened by firm's disclosure quality, women independent directors and board gender diversity, but attenuated by CEO duality. The overall result suggests that apart from independent audit committee, the statutory and demographic attributes of independent directors and board diversity, and firm's disclosure quality are complementary to board independence in preventing persistent PIBT.Originality/valueThis study augments the existing corporate governance and information-based trading literature from the perspectives of firm's disclosure quality, and the statutory and demographic roles of independent directors and board diversity attributes, by examining their effects on the relationship between board independence and PIBT.


2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (7) ◽  
pp. 1418-1436 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fabio Mazzola ◽  
Pietro Pizzuto ◽  
Giovanni Ruggieri

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to verifying the economic resilience of islands and, in particular, the role of the tourism sector in the reaction to the most recent economic crisis. The analysis concerns insular contexts, such as the greater island regions in the Mediterranean basin. Design/methodology/approach Static and dynamic panel data techniques are used for a sample of 13 island economies over a period of 16 years. Findings Results show that the growth factors for regional islands are similar to the ones usually considered for other regions, but the tourism-led growth hypothesis is highly supported. Tourism demand more than supply plays a role together with accessibility. The crisis has reduced the importance of tourism supply, while tourism demand and accessibility have remained crucial for growth together with other traditional engines of growth. Originality/value To the best of authors’ knowledge, none of the current works has considered territorial determinants and tourism indicators inside the same framework analyzing growth in island economies by considering the changes occurred during the crisis explicitly.


2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 719-737 ◽  
Author(s):  
Md Mamunur Rashid

Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine the mediating role of corporate board characteristics in the relationship between ownership structure and firm performance in the listed public limited companies of Bangladesh. Design/methodology/approach The study analyzed 527 annual reports of listed companies in Bangladesh for the years 2015-2017. The direct and indirect effect of ownership structure on firm performance was examined using AMOS 23. Baron and Kenny’s (1986) four steps procedure was used to establish the mediating role of board characteristics. Findings The results demonstrated that foreign ownership and director ownership have significant positive influence on both accounting and market based firm’s performance, while institutional ownership exhibits positive influence only on accounting-based performance (return on assets). With respect to mediating effect, the results show that board size and board independence partially mediate the relationship between ownership structure and firm performance. Research limitations/implications The major limitation of the study is that it focuses only on three years data in examining the hypothesized relationship among the variables. Practical implications Investors, regulators and managers can get evocative insights, particularly who seek to improve their company’s performance in the capital market through restructuring their ownership structure and board composition. Originality/value The study focuses on both direct and indirect effect of ownership structure on firm performance in the context of an emerging and developing economy. In examining the indirect effect, the study uses board size and board independence as the mediating variables.


2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 133-165
Author(s):  
Bijoy Rakshit ◽  
Yadawananda Neog

PurposeThe primary purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the impact of educational attainment on crime rates across 33 Indian states over the period 2001 to 2013. This paper also examines the role of various macroeconomic, socio-economic and demographic factors in determining the variation of crimes in India.Design/methodology/approachFirst, this paper provides a representative theoretical model and discusses the possible relationship between crime and education. Second, the paper applies a dynamic panel data (DPD) model to extract more precise, unbiased and reliable estimates of the effect of education in abating different crime rates. The main advantage of using the dynamic panel model is to address the problem of endogeneity in some regressors and capture the time persistent effect of education on crime.FindingsEmpirical findings reveal that a 1% increase in gross enrolment ratio leads to the reduction of total crime by 8%. However, a unique finding identifies a positive association between tertiary education and economic crime. This finding further goes against the general belief that criminals tend to be less educated than non-criminals.Practical implicationsThis paper recommends that instead of punishment and mandatory law enforcement for offenders, increase in government expenditure and different educational attainment ratios can go a long way to combat crime in India, which has posed a serious threat to the stability of society. Furthermore, utilizing the information on offenders' educational attainment in examining the crime rates can be a future research agenda for policymakers.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the empirical debate of ‘crime-education nexus’ by examining the role of education on crime in India. This study is the first of its kind that focuses on the aspects of crime and education more recently and investigates the relationship between crime and education due to the recent changes in educational attainment ratios and crime rate.


2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 561-581 ◽  
Author(s):  
Affaf Asghar ◽  
Seemab Sajjad ◽  
Aamer Shahzad ◽  
Bolaji Tunde Matemilola

Purpose Corporate governance (CG) is an ongoing interesting topic getting the attention of market participant, business regulators and researchers in today’s business environment. The purpose of this study is to analyze the moderating role of earnings management on CG-value and CG-risk relationship in the emerging economy of Pakistan. Design/methodology/approach A panel data analysis is used in this study. A panel data of 71 non-financial listed companies of Pakistan for the 2008-2017 period is considered for this study. Secondary data is collected from the annual reports of non-financial firms listed on PSX. Seven econometric equations are developed to test the research hypothesis. Findings The results reveal that CG significantly enhances the firm value and performance measures. Moreover, CG mitigates the practices of earning management and eliminates the risk that develops opportunistic behavior among managers to commit frauds. Practical implications The results of this study suggest that the board of directors (BODs) should intensify their governance role and ensure that the executives perform their duties to maximize the wealth of the shareholders and not engage in any misrepresentation of accounts that may lower the company position and decrease the firm value. Moreover, the managers should be informed about their accountability and acknowledged that at the end of the year, they would be audited by an expert’s auditors for their responsibilities. Concerning regulatory bodies, regulatory authorities should ensure that there must be at least one independent member on the board. The better-governed system reduces both agency conflicts and enhances firm value. Originality/value A number of studies have already been undertaken by multiple investigators to build connection among CG with firm performance, but there is not even a single study in the literature that considers CG, firm value, firm Risk and discretionary earning management as a whole in one model to generalize its results in the emerging economy of Pakistan. A fundamental element of current analyzation process addresses that this is the very first graft of study conducted in Pakistan having combination of four variables together in one revision. There is minimal work that focuses on moderating effects of earning management on the CG-value and CG-risk relationships. This study uses two standard measures of firm performance (i.e. ROA and Tobin’s Q), one proxy of earning management (DEM) and three attributes of CG (board size, audit quality and ownership structure). Previously, researchers have not investigated a model that combines variables (CG as independent and Firm performance and Firm Risk as dependent along with DEM as moderator) in a single study.


2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mejbel Al-Saidi

Purpose This paper aims to reduce the knowledge gap by using a large sample and different regressions while controlling the endogeneity and causality issues. Design/methodology/approach This study used the ordinary least square (OLS) and two stage least squares (2SLS) regressions to control the endogeneity and causality problems; this estimation strategy allows for comparison of both estimates to identify any inconsistency and biases in the parameters. Findings General speaking, this study found that board independence negatively affected firm performance based on Tobin’s Q only and the relationship between the two variables ran from board independence to firm performance but not vice versa. Originality/value The current independent directors are not adding value to Kuwait’s listed firms. Some directors who represent large shareholders and the conflict between large shareholders and small shareholders could affect the role of independent directors in Kuwait. To best of the researchers’ knowledge, this study is the first to consider board independent after controlling the issues of endogeneity and causality in Kuwait; thus, the results could be useful for Kuwaiti firms, regulators and policymakers.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammed W.A. Saleh ◽  
Mohammad A.A. Zaid ◽  
Rabee Shurafa ◽  
Zaharaddeen Salisu Maigoshi ◽  
Marwan Mansour ◽  
...  

Purpose This study aims to examine how the salient board gender diversity among board directors affects firm performance both directly and indirectly, through the role of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in listed firms on the Palestine Stock Exchange over the period 2010–2017. Design/methodology/approach Based on panel data of 384 observations from all firms listed on the Palestine Security Exchange during the period from 2010 to 2017, this study uses panel data regression to examine the effect of the predictors on firm performance. In addition, to mitigate the endogeneity issue, the analysis was repeated by using one-step generalized method of moments. Findings The results show that board gender diversity has a positive and insignificant influence on firm performance. However, under the moderating effect of CSR, the finding turns from positive insignificant to positive significant. Originality/value The study is timely given that gender diversity plays pivotal roles in determining the performance in terms of monitoring and controlling and further willing to engage in social responsibility. The prior research in Palestine has never investigated the effect of board gender diversity. As such, Palestine has not established a legal quota of minimum female representation on boards, and because of it, the country has weak women’s representation among firms. It, therefore, becomes a necessity to examine the influence of board gender diversity on the financial performance of listed firms in Palestine. Besides, the mixed result in previous literature on the board gender diversity and firm performance indicates that there is an indirect effect that needs alternative explanations.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Saleh Abd Alhadi ◽  
Rosmila Senik ◽  
Jalila Johari ◽  
Ridzwana Mohd Said ◽  
Hairul Suhaimi Nahar

Purpose This study aims to investigate whether higher earnings quality is related to the existence of multiple directorships among corporate boards and whether this relationship varies with the quality of investor protection. Design/methodology/approach This paper used a dynamic panel data modelling on the sample of 2,090 firm-year observations over the period from 2007 to 2016 in Malaysia. The generalized method of moments estimators were used to deal with endogeneity and other econometric problems. Findings This study finds that the accumulation of several outside directorships is negatively associated with the firm's earnings quality, as measured by the magnitude of discretionary accruals. More importantly, the findings provide evidence that multiple directors are more efficient in improving earnings quality in healthy investor protection environment. Practical implications The appointment of directors should be based on market-based and not on a relationship (i.e. financial and industry professionals). Originality/value The results highlight the importance of interaction between internal and external governance mechanisms to improve the firm's financial performance, investment and market efficiency. High-quality investor protection and law enforcement are significant for enhancing the monitoring role of multiple directorships in improving earnings quality.


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