Social and Environmental Disclosure in Saudi Companies

There is a growth in demand by stakeholders for companies to demonstrate greater transparency on their social and environmental performance. Few studies have been conducted in Saudi Arabia on the area of voluntary disclosure. The present study aims to evaluate the current level of social and environmental disclosure (SED) and to investigate the influence of the variables (size, industry, sector, age, capital raised, and audit firm size) on the general level of social and environmental disclosure in the nonfinancial companies in Saudi Stock Market (SSM). The disclosure index is constructed of 25 items to evaluate the level of disclosure in the 2008 annual reports of all the 93 nonfinancial companies in Saudi Stock Market. The relationships between the disclosure level of the six variables are investigated using ordinary least square regression model. Results show that the level of social and environmental disclosure level is very low for Saudi nonfinancial listed companies. Company size and sector are found to be significantly associated with the level of disclosure. However, the remaining variables are not significantly correlated with disclosure level. This study makes a positive contribution to enhance general knowledge of SED practices and can help Saudi authorities to enforce new policies toward social and environmental reporting

The moderating effects of governance on the relationship between investment opportunites, leverage and ownership indentity with firm performance in the UAE

This study evaluates corporate governance practices of listed firms in the UAE and examines the hypothesized influence of investment opportunities, leverage, foreign and institutional ownership on firm performance. Corporate governance strength is also investigated as a moderator between investment opportunities, leverage, foreign, institutional ownership and firm performance. The moderating impact of corporate governance strength is also examined during the global financial crisis. After constructing an index to measure corporate governance strength, the fixed effects regression in panel data was used to analyze the data. The data included 101 firms with a total of 501 firm-year observations that spanned the period 2008 to 2012, of all the firms listed on the Abu Dhabi Stock Exchange and the Dubai Financial Market. The results show a significant influence of investment opportunities, leverage and institutional ownership on firm performance represented by Return on Assets (ROA) and Refined Economic Value Added (REVA). However, the results find no influence of foreign ownership on ROA, and a negative influence on REVA. The governance index shows a dramatic improvement in the corporate governance practices over time. In addition, corporate governance strength is found to significantly moderate the relationship between investment opportunities, leverage, foreign and institutional ownership with ROA, but only moderates the relationship between leverage and REVA. During the crisis, corporate governance strength appears to play a more efficient moderating role. The findings of this study provide some insights to the regulators and other related parties about the status of corporate governance practices in the UAE and show that good corporate governance is indirectly able to improve the performance of firms during different time periods