Investors’ Moral and Financial Concerns—Ethical and Financial Divestment in the Fossil Fuel Industry

Yiping Zhang and Olaf Weber
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Yiping Zhang: School of Environment, Enterprise and Development (SEED), University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON N2L 3G1, Canada
Olaf Weber: School of Environment, Enterprise and Development (SEED), University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON N2L 3G1, Canada

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 4, 1-12

Abstract: It is discussed intensively whether divestment decease sales in the fossil fuel industry or whether investors divest from the fossil fuel industry because of stranded assets. Furthermore, it is unclear what the consequences of these activities are for the fossil fuel industry. Therefore, the study explores the direction of causality between cash flow factors, such as production factors and sources of financing and sales of the fossil fuel industry using lagged regression models and applying the Granger causality test. Our sample consists of fossil fuel companies from the Carbon Underground 200 list. Because R-squared values for both lagged financial factors and lagged sales were similar, we suggest a “bi-directional causality” between the financial flow factors and sales. We conclude that divestment (because of ethical concerns) can cause lower sales and that lower sales can cause divestment because of fear of the risk of stranded assets. Because a third factor usually causes bi-directional causations, we conclude that the need for the fossil fuel industry to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is the third factor that influences both the ethical and financial motivation of divestment. Consequently, the study contributes to theoretical approaches to divestment.

Keywords: divestment; climate change; fossil fuels; production function; socially responsible investment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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