Climate change disclosure and evolving institutional investor salience: Roles of the Principles for Responsible Investment

Abstract

This study investigates the relationship between climate change disclosure and institutional investors. A particular focus of the present study is the question of if and how the relationship is affected by the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI). A relevant context to the question is shareholder engagement, where institutional investors' legitimacy affects the outcomes. Thus, this study examines Japan, where shareholder engagement is the main pathway for institutional investors to convey their ESG‐related influence to investee companies. Using the stakeholder salience theory as a theoretical framework, the empirical results of analyzing 17,604 firm‐year eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) documents of listed Japanese companies provide evidence for the following. First, institutional stakeholders' holding ratio has positively influenced corporate climate change disclosure (power). Second, the positive influence of institutional investors is more significant when PRI‐signed institutional investors are present (legitimacy). Third, the aforementioned relations gained statistical significance gradually during the analysis period (urgency). Fundamentally, this study shows that the stakeholder salience theory contributes to a deeper understanding of the relationship.