CORPORATE SOCIAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL PERFORMANCE, CONSERVATIVE ACCOUNTING PRACTICES AND THE MARKET VALUE OF LISTED FIRMS IN NIGERIA
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Date
2022
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Abstract
Corporate environmental and social activities are expected to improve the value of firms in the long term. However, when corporate social and environmental performance activities negatively affect a firm's value, as some reviewed studies revealed, this causes problems when rational decisions are made, and firms choose not to invest in these activities. This disparity in results was successfully explained by certain factors like the level of conservative accounting practice inherent in the preparation of financial reports. The study introduced a moderator (conservative accounting practices) to analyse its effect on corporate social and environmental performance and the market value of listed firms in Nigeria. Also, the study examined firms separately based on their environmental sensitivity categorisation. One hundred and thirty-one firms listed in the Nigerian Exchange Group were examined across the eleven sectors with sixyear observations (2014 2019). Data were collected from secondary sources such as annual reports, sustainability reports, websites and any publication by the examined companies. Panel least square regression was employed as a data analysis method for testing hypotheses. The findings revealed an insignificant influence of corporate environmental and social performance on the market value separately. This result reveals that social and environmental performance activities are insufficient to impact firm value. The findings also revealed an insignificant influence of conservative accounting practice on the market value. When the study introduced conservative accounting practice as a moderator, the results revealed the complementary moderating influence of conservative accounting practices on the value of environmental The results also revealed the moderating influence of conservative accounting practices on the significance. These results are in line with the A-priori expectation. The thesis recommends that conservative accounting practices be engaged when firms are involved in social and environmental activities because of their moderating effect, and conservative accounting practices improve reporting quality. Managers are expected to increase their social and environmentally friendly activities to improve the significance of their influence on the value of their firms. Because of their positive coefficient, environmental activities such as product innovations should be focused on. However, one of the policy implications encourages the manager to ensure that the financial and non-financial cost of engaging in socially and environmentally friendly activities in Nigeria is not detrimental to the going concern of the business.