The impact of sustainability (environmental, social, and governance) disclosure and board diversity on firm value: The moderating role of industry sensitivity

Abstract : Using a large panel data set comprising 812 listed European firms, this study investigates whether sustainability disclosure environmental, social, and governance) and female representation on boards affect firm value. We observe a positive impact of sustainability disclosure and board gender diversity on firm value, suggesting that the best management practices, enhanced takeholder trust, and female representation on boards improve firm value. We observe that the firms in sensitive industries achieve superior social and governance performance. We also observe that the firms with higher female representation on their boards present significantly superior environmental, social, and governance performance. Our results are robust to different firm and country specific control variables and to year- and country-fixed effects.