Social Responsibility Information Disclosure And Financial Performance

Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR)and Social Responsibility Information Disclosure(CSRD)are of great significance to the growth and development of enterprises,and are also key links to stabilize capital markets and promote sustainable socio-economic development.However,due to the information asymmetry in the capital market,there is a huge information gap between creditors and companies,whose investment decisions are subject to great uncertainty and have to bear heavy financial risks,which also leads to constraints on enterprises’ financing activities and thus affects their financial performance performance.Limited by the government’s preferential financing policies and the limited capital market environment,it is more important for enterprises to think about how to grow their business performance,expand their competitive advantages in the market,and enhance their market value from their own perspective.The active implementation of CSRD can send a positive signal to the capital market,can break the gap between enterprises and stakeholders,help build a good reputation,establish a positive image,promote the sustainable development of enterprises,and to a certain extent can reduce debt financing costs and enhance corporate value.Therefore,it is meaningful to add the cost of debt financing into the relationship between CSRD and corporate financial performance for research.First,the relevant domestic and foreign literature on the relationship between these three is systematically reviewed and sorted out,and a research review is conducted on this basis.Second,the concepts of CSR,CSRD,debt financing cost and corporate financial performance are defined,and stakeholder theory,signaling theory and optimal order financing theory are elaborated.Again,research hypotheses are proposed and research models are constructed based on the literature and related theories.Then,combined with the data,this paper analyzes the current situation of social responsibility information disclosure in China.Finally,this paper selects 1103 Shanghai and Shenzhen A-share listed companies that disclosed social responsibility reports during 2010-2020 as research samples to empirically investigate the relationship between CSRD and corporate financial performance and the mediating effect of debt financing cost.The results of the study indicate that(1)active CSRD contributes to the improvement of the level of corporate financial performance,and this relationship is more significant in non-state-owned enterprises.(2)CSRD level is significantly and negatively related to the cost of debt financing.(3)A new influence path for the relationship between CSRD and corporate financial performance is revealed,the cost of debt financing plays a partially mediating role in the relationship between CSRD and corporate financial performance.Based on the findings,suggestions are made on how to cultivate and strengthen the awareness of social responsibility,how to improve the quality of social responsibility information disclosure,and how to promote enterprises to maintain a positive attitude toward disclosure from both listed companies and government departments,while the shortcomings in the research process and future research improvements and prospects are also pointed out.