Douse the flames or fuel the fire? The impact of ESG mutual funds on strategic textual disclosure in ESG reports

IF 11.1 1区管理学 Q1 BUSINESS

Journal of Business Research Pub Date : 2026-04-01 Epub Date: 2026-02-12 DOI:10.1016/j.jbusres.2026.116071

Ruiqian Li , Jihui Dong , Muyao Li

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Abstract

As sustainable development gathers momentum, ESG mutual funds have expanded rapidly and attracted considerable market attention. As institutional investors, ESG mutual funds may either monitor management or collude with management. This paper investigates the impact of ESG mutual funds on strategic textual disclosure in ESG reports. Using a sample of Chinese A‐share listed firms from 2013 to 2023, we find that higher ESG mutual fund ownership is associated with lower strategic textual disclosure, supporting the effective monitoring hypothesis. Mechanism tests show that both internal and external governance play complementary roles, reinforcing the monitoring effect of ESG mutual funds on strategic textual disclosure. Heterogeneity analyses reveal that this monitoring effect varies across industry contexts, managerial traits, and external information environments. Economic consequence analyses demonstrate that the decline in strategic textual disclosure driven by ESG mutual funds is associated with lower ESG rating disagreement, narrower analyst forecast dispersion, and reduced equity mispricing.

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扑灭火焰还是火上浇油？ESG共同基金对ESG报告战略文本披露的影响

随着可持续发展势头的增强，ESG共同基金规模迅速扩大，受到了市场的广泛关注。作为机构投资者，ESG共同基金要么监督管理层，要么与管理层串通。本文研究了ESG共同基金对ESG报告战略文本披露的影响。以2013年至2023年的中国a股上市公司为样本，我们发现ESG共同基金拥有量越高，战略文本披露越低，这支持了有效监测假设。机制测试表明，内部治理和外部治理相互补充，强化了ESG共同基金对战略文本披露的监测作用。异质性分析表明，这种监测效果在行业背景、管理特征和外部信息环境中有所不同。经济后果分析表明，由ESG共同基金推动的战略文本披露减少与ESG评级分歧降低、分析师预测差异缩小以及股票错误定价减少有关。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Journal of Business Research BUSINESS-

CiteScore

20.30

自引率

10.60%

发文量

956

期刊介绍： The Journal of Business Research aims to publish research that is rigorous, relevant, and potentially impactful. It examines a wide variety of business decision contexts, processes, and activities, developing insights that are meaningful for theory, practice, and/or society at large. The research is intended to generate meaningful debates in academia and practice, that are thought provoking and have the potential to make a difference to conceptual thinking and/or practice. The Journal is published for a broad range of stakeholders, including scholars, researchers, executives, and policy makers. It aids the application of its research to practical situations and theoretical findings to the reality of the business world as well as to society. The Journal is abstracted and indexed in several databases, including Social Sciences Citation Index, ANBAR, Current Contents, Management Contents, Management Literature in Brief, PsycINFO, Information Service, RePEc, Academic Journal Guide, ABI/Inform, INSPEC, etc.