题　目：Environmental and Social Litigation Risk and Corporate Misconduct

嘉　宾：吴弘 副教授 复旦大学

主持人：幸婧 副教授 上海交通大学安泰经济与管理学院

时　间：2024年10月9日（周三）13:30-15:00

地　点：上海交通大学 徐汇校区安泰楼A507室

内容简介:

Environmental and social (ES) regulations impose significant litigation risks on firms. In this paper, we explore how litigation risks affect corporate ES misconduct and drive a range of ES-enhancing governance and investment activities. We measure ES-related litigation risk by using the political ideology of circuit judges and find that higher ex-ante ES litigation risk is associated with reduced ES misconduct. Validation tests confirm that higher ES litigation risk is linked to more ES lawsuits and a greater likelihood of outcomes favoring plaintiffs. Additionally, investors react negatively to the deaths of conservative judges, particularly for firms with a higher probability of involvement in ES lawsuits. Our main findings are robust to an instrumental variable approach using the deaths of conservative judges as exogenous shocks. We further demonstrate that in response to heightened ES litigation risks, firms strengthen the link between executive pay and ES goals, enhance board monitoring of ES activities, produce more and better green innovation, and conduct fewer acquisitions of targets with poor ES profiles. Overall, our findings show that heightened litigation risks deter corporate ES misconduct and promote stronger ES-aligned governance and investment strategies.

演讲人简介：

Hong Wu is an Associate Professor (with tenure) at Fudan University. His research focuses on financial accounting, auditing, empirical corporate finance, and corporate governance. His work has been published in leading academic journals in accounting and finance, including The Accounting Review and Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis.

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