Do foreign institutional investors drive corporate social responsibility? Evidence from listed firms in China
Zhe Li,
Ping Wang and
Tianlong Wu
Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, 2021, vol. 48, issue 1-2, 338-373
Abstract:
This paper investigates the effect of qualified foreign institutional investors (QFIIs) on corporate social responsibility (CSR) within the context of listed firms in China. We find that QFIIs offer an incisive channel for improving socially responsible practices. In addition, we find that firms with QFIIs are more likely to comply with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) guidelines, and that their sustainability reports tend to be longer. We also find that this positive effect is more pronounced in firms with low initial CSR scores than those with high CSR scores at the time when QFIIs enter the sample. Our empirical evidence further confirms that this positive impact is driven by QFIIs from countries with high social awareness, or QFIIs from geographically distant countries, consistent with their motives, and is linked to the ownership of QFIIs, especially when the QFII is among the top ten of the largest shareholders. Finally, our extended analysis reveals that the increase in CSR performance associated with the presence of QFIIs results in greater firm performance and easier access to finance.
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (36)
Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/jbfa.12481
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:bla:jbfnac:v:48:y:2021:i:1-2:p:338-373
Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0306-686X
Access Statistics for this article
Journal of Business Finance & Accounting is currently edited by P. F. Pope, A. W. Stark and M. Walker
More articles in Journal of Business Finance & Accounting from Wiley Blackwell
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().