Non-financial disclosure and women on board: Is a mandatory approach on gender quotas effective to increase communication quality?

By | 2022-02-03T11:53:40+01:00 February 3rd, 2022|

Rebecca Miccini / Financial Reporting / 2-2021

The present study investigates the effects of women on companies’ boards on the quality of non-financial information, and the influence that a mandatory approach has on this relationship. Previous studies have dealt with analysing the effects of female presence on CSR or ESG information, but few pieces of research have taken into account other strands of non-financial information and have re-sorted to an index to measure its quality. Therefore, this study aims to contribute by extending the analysis to any type of non-financial information communicated by a company. Moreover, the present research contributes to the strand of literature investigating the role of women on companies’ boards. In fact, the results of the OLS regression analysis demonstrated that the presence of women with an executive role positively influences the quality of disclosure in Italy, and this relationship is not influenced by the advanced stage of application of the regulation on gender quotas. Moreover, disclosure quality is significantly higher for firms that disclose a non-financial statement. Nevertheless, the study suffers from some limitations with respect to the sample size and the analysis of the trend in reporting after the introduction of Directive 2014/95/EU.

 

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Beyond Financial Reporting. Integrated Reporting and its determinants: Evidence from the context of European state-owned enterprises

By | 2020-02-11T12:04:04+01:00 February 11th, 2020|

Nicolò Giuseppe, Zanellato Gianluca, Manes-Rossi Francesca, Tiron-Tudor Adriana / Financial Reporting / 2-2019

Integrated reporting (IR), which aims to overcome the limitations of both traditional financial and stand-alone non-financial reports, has gained momentum as a single comprehensive tool merging financial and non-financial information. Initially conceived for private sector entities, IR is also establishing itself in the public sector context as a vehicle for transparency and accountability. This research offers empirical investigation of IR practices in the State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) context. More specifically, the paper investigates the levels of disclosure provided through IR by a sample of 34 European SOEs and explores the effects of potential explanatory factors. The results indicate a fair level of IR disclosure and a trend of reporting information already requested under international accounting standards. The findings also highlight that industry (basic materials and financials) and size positively influence the level of IR disclosure in a particularly strong way, while governance features (board size and board gender diversity) and the provision of external assurance do not exert any impact.

integrated reporting, state-owned enterprises, non-financial disclosure, accountability

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The level of compliance with the Italian Legislative Decree No. 254/2016 and its determinants: Insights from Italy

By | 2019-09-27T10:36:51+02:00 September 27th, 2019|

Cantino Valter, Devalle Alain, Fiandrino Simona, Busso Donatella / Financial Reporting / 1-2019

The present research explores non-financial mandatory disclosure in Italy in light of the recent Italian Legislative Decree No. 254/2016 on “the disclosure of non-financial and diversity information”. The study pursues a twofold aim: first, it seeks to measure the level of compliance of non-financial information (NFI) with non-financial mandatory disclosure; and second, it seeks to identify which determinants favor higher compliance levels in the first year of the regulatory adequacy. To these ends, the study examines the non-financial 2017 statements of 50 listed Italian companies to test by means of a NFI Disclosure Score three determinants that could explain the level of compliance. The NFI Disclosure Score was set at 52.58%. Moreover, findings suggest that the type of reporting channels (stand-alone report or disclosure included in the Annual Report), the Guidelines Reporting Initiative (GRI) options chosen by the companies, and the presence of the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Committee within the board all affect compliance levels. This study is one of the first research conducted on mandatory NFI disclosure providing indications for regulators and companies on how to improve NFI disclosure.

non-financial disclosure, mandatory disclosure, non-financial infromation, Italy, Directive 2014/95/EU

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Put Your Money where Your Mouth is: The Difference between Real Commitment to Sustainability and Mere Rhetoric

By | 2017-12-22T10:26:32+01:00 December 21st, 2017|

Bini Laura, Bellucci Marco, Giunta Francesco/ Financial Reporting, Riviste / Fascicolo: 2-2016

Companies exhibit growing interest in sustainability rhetoric. Such an interest is alternatively justified by a company’s need to address legitimacy instances, rather than to satisfy stakeholders’ requests about its sustainability performance. Whatever the case, a main debated issue concerning sustainability rhetoric deals with the difficulties in understanding whether companies’ commitment towards sustainability is “real”, or it only consists of “empty words” that hide opportunistic strategies. Our paper contributes to this debate, proposing a methodological approach, which is based on a company’s business model (BM) representation. We argue that the inclusion of adequate sustainability information in a company’s BM representation can testify to a real company’s engagement, as it illustrates how sustainability affects its value creation process. Compared to extant methodological proposals, mainly based on linguistic analyses, our approach does not require specific competences to be applied. Moreover, it saves user’s time, as it allows the assessment of entire company’s sustainability rhetoric through the analysis of the information reported in its BM. Our approach is consistent with previous contributions that propose a company’s BM as a representation device able to illustrate strategic information that cannot be represented in the traditional corporate reporting. Our approach proposes a possible answer to address the challenges faced by regulators and standard setters involved in the regulation of sustainability disclosure. Such approach has found a first step of implementation in the UK, where since 2013, listed companies are requested to describe their BM in Strategic Reports.

Keywords: Sustainability rhetoric, business model, corporate social responsibility, non-financial disclosure, mining industry

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