Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) Tweets: Do Shareholders Care?

Marion Dupire, Jean-Yves Filbien and Bouchra M’zali
Additional contact information
Marion Dupire: IÉSEG School Of Management [Puteaux], LUMEN - Lille University Management Lab - ULR 4999 - Université de Lille
Jean-Yves Filbien: Université de Lille, LUMEN - Lille University Management Lab - ULR 4999 - Université de Lille
Bouchra M’zali: UQAM - Université du Québec à Montréal = University of Québec in Montréal

Post-Print from HAL

Abstract: We study how messages on Twitter by large non-governmental organizations (NGOs), targeting companies from the S&P500, affect these companies' stock prices. With a sample of 1,611 tweets between 2009 and 2017 by 18 large NGOs, we observe significant changes in the stock prices of the targeted firms. More specifically, NGO tweets stating a positive message about the environmental, social, or governance (ESG). Actions of the firm have a positive effect on stock prices, while negative tweets have a negative effect. Nevertheless, we find that the presence of institutional owners hampers this effect: firms with high institutional ownership value positive tweets more negatively, and negative tweets more positively. These results support the idea that shareholders react significantly to NGO tweets but they react differently depending on their time horizon: for shareholders who have a more short-term horizon, typically institutional owners, the reaction diverges societal expectations about how firms should contribute to society.

Date: 2021-01-18
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published in Business and Society, 2021, 61 (2), pp.419-456. ⟨10.1177/0007650320985204⟩

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04409565

DOI: 10.1177/0007650320985204

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Post-Print from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().