Public companies non-financial reporting and audit in Ukraine: challenges and prospects

Public interest entities and public companies as their representatives should be an example in implementing of sustainable development initiatives (sustainable development goals of the United Nations, development strategy «Europe-2020», «Sustainable Development Strategy»Ukraine-2020») in the light of Association agreement. Main challenges for Ukrainian public companies are non-financial information disclosure and assurance of both financial and non-financial reporting through statutory audit. Key prospects of public companies accounting system reform were outlined in this regard. This research may contribute to the existing literature in regard of identifying key areas of improving financial and non-financial information PIEs disclosure as well as its independent verification through statutory audit. This improvement should incorporate European experience and provision of Directive 2014/95 / EU, Directive 2013/34 / EU, Directive 2014/56 / EU and Regulation (EU) no. 537/2014. Among the promising areas of research, introduction of integrated reporting for Ukrainian PIEs is worth noting

BANKING RISKS: ENHANCING REQUIREMENTS CONCERNING RISK MANAGEMENT AND INFORMATION DISCLOSURE

The article deals with the nature,basic principles and objectives of the bank risk management system under modern conditions and the requirements of regulators to the transparency of its activities are considered. The authors developed a scheme of risk management and justified basic disclosure of banking risks in the context of introduction of the International Financial Reporting Standards

Sustainability reporting in the light of corporate social responsibility development: economic and legal issues

Independent audit assurance of sustainability reporting is the basis for increasing the credibility of the stakeholders, its transparency and reliability; it is a means of implementing legal liability of the company and the evidence of achievement of its legitimacy to the public. The bases for providing such assurance are the standards of implementation of audit tasks in the sphere of sustainable development. Comparative analysis of international practice as for assurance regarding the SR with local realities, based on the reporting database of Ukrainian GRI companies for the 2005-2014 years, witnessed the initial phase of such practices among Ukrainian companies, and the need to strengthen regulatory efforts to determine the legal status of SR auditing standards in Ukraine, ensuring a legal environment and the development of corporate social responsibility initiatives

Мethodological principles for assessing the transparency of energy companies of Ukraine

In modern conditions, the Concept of Sustainable Development has become a mandatory component of the strategy of any enterprise. This is facilitated by many factors, the main of which is the increasing of sustainable companies’ competitiveness because of improvement of stakeholders` attitude towards the company, which causes both increasing of the demand and increasing of its investment attractiveness. Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 7 occupies a special place among all goals of sustainable development, because on the one hand, most of the SDGs can be implemented exclusively with the provision of energy, on the other hand, the energy sector is traditionally one of the main sources of environmental pollution, which can be significantly reduced by transition to renewable energy. The relevance of the study is also connected with the crucial need to restore the energy infrastructure of Ukraine  destroyed during the invasion by the aggressor country; the investment process can only take place under the conditions of transparency of the investment objects. This study is aimed toward formation of methodological principles of Ukrainian energy companies` transparency evaluating. Based on foreign authors works studying the authors propose the mechanism for calculating the integral indicator of transparency of energy companies of Ukraine, which includes four groups of factors (CSR factors, ESG factors, SD factors, assessment of the fight against corruption). Each factor is evaluated using binary evaluations based on studying of public information of companies (management reports, integrated reports, information on the company's official website). The use of the proposed methodological principles will contribute to increasing the transparency of companies in the energy sector of Ukraine, which should significantly accelerate the attraction of investments for the restoration of the energy infrastructure destroyed during military operations

Environmental, social and governance investment standardization: moving towards sustainable economy

This paper is devoted to the investigation of environmental, social and governance investment (investment with ESG criterion) normative base in the context of standardization process in sustainable economy financing. Complexity of such standardization and the lack of commonly accepted regulations, indexes metrics are under discussions of scholars, which encourage the need for clear guidance in ESG investment. 651 sustainability rating products and more than 300 investment policy instruments in different countries show the need for classifying the ESG standards. The solution of this scientific and practical task is based on the developed ESG investment standards system classifications. Proposed classification incorporates such criteria as level of standards adoption, mandatory degree, sectorial specificity, degree of companies’ awareness of responsible activity, ensuring transparency and the benchmarks formation, creating the institutional support of the ESG investment standardization process in sustainable economy and making more grounded investment and regulatory decisions

BANKING RISKS: ENHANCING REQUIREMENTS CONCERNING RISK MANAGEMENT AND INFORMATION DISCLOSURE

The article deals with the nature,basic principles and objectives of the bank risk management system under modern conditions and the requirements of regulators to the transparency of its activities are considered. The authors developed a scheme of risk management and justified basic disclosure of banking risks in the context of introduction of the International Financial Reporting Standards

Environmental responsibility mechanism development in the public sector of the economy

Environmental responsibility mechanism in the public sector of the economy has an important sense in UN Sustainability Development Goals achievement, as well as in ensuring the competitiveness of the state-owned companies and the state as a whole. Sustainability concept, concept of “smart cities and smart communities” and the implementation of public administration reform, the necessity to increase the transparency of state-owned companies and the responsibility of municipalities to communities determine the reasonability and urgency in environmental responsibility mechanism development. Systematization and comparative analysis of world and national experience of environmental responsibility mechanism development in the public sector of the economy were made. The author’s approach to the structuring of the mechanism of environmental responsibility in the public sector was developed. Public policy peculiarities implementation in the field of environmental responsibility were investigated considering the levels of regulation of such liability: in state-owned companies as models for other sectors of the economy; in public authorities and municipalities

Transition to sustainability reporting: evidence from EU and Ukraine

Sustainable Development Goal of UN (Goal 12.6), the accounting statements of the Association Agreement with the European Union and Section IV of the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area between Ukraine and the EU, Sustainability strategies “Europe – 2020” and “Ukraine – 2020”, the provisions of Directive 2014/95/EU are the guidelines for constructing a sustainability reporting system of Ukrainian companies because of the low level of corporate social responsibility perception in the national environment and the need for implementation of European integration initiatives. Sustainability reporting comparative analysis of European and Ukrainian companies has been performed basing on the GRI data for 1999-2016. This allows us to conclude about proportionality and comparability in the use of research database. However, the results of this study indicate significant differences in the level of sustainability reporting development in Ukraine and the EU. This primarily refers to the number of organizations that make reports and dynamics of disclosure during the period of 1999-2016, company size, industry characteristics and type of applied reporting standards. Based on the analysis carried out the authors formulated the main causes, consequences and trends in national practice of sustainbility disclosure in the context of implementing of Directive 2014/95/EU. Thisresearch may contribute to the existing literature in regard identifying key areas ofsustainability reporting development in Ukraine on the basis of comparison with the best European experience and its compliance with the requirements of Directive 2014/95/EU. Among the issues that require further research, we should recall the relationship between the formation of the corporate social responsibility model and sustainability reporting disclosure as well as the influence of the institutional environment. Among the perspective areas of research, the expand of time horizons of analysis for the 2017-2018 years after the publication of the first reports prepared in accordance with the requirements of Directive 2014/95/EU is worth noting. Limitations of the research carried out сoncerning the size of the sample of Ukrainian companies were analyzed

Market efficiency of traditional stock market indices and social responsible indices: the role of sustainability reporting

Corporate social responsibility, disclosed in sustainability reporting, influences the financial performance of companies. As a result, traditional stock market indices (TI) are expanded with the social responsible stock market indices (SRI). The aim of this study was to establish whether there are any differences in the behavior of the TI and SRI. To do this, the authors analyzed their efficiency. They used R/S analysis to calculate the Hurst exponent as a measure of persistence (long-term memory property). The presence of persistence was evidence in favor of less efficiency. According to empirical results, SRI has lower efficiency, in particular the Dow Jones Sustainability Index. Lower efficiency was also observed in the emerging markets with a responsible investment segment, compared to the traditional stock market indices. Further standardization and a common methodological approach to corporate sustainability reporting disclosure are proposed

Institutional support for sustainable development financing in the light of the multistakeholder approach

Purpose. The purpose of the article is to classify institutions funding sustainable development initiatives and to study their experience at the European and national levels. Methodology / approach. As a meaningful methodological basis for the classification of the multilevel system of institutions, funding sustainable development initiatives, the multistakeholder approach is used and as a technical tool – typology method. Application of these methods, along with comparative analysis, allowed to generalize the experience of organizing institutional support for financing sustainable development initiatives at European and national level. Results. In the world and the EU there is a significant number of institutions, which in their totality create institutional support for the financing of sustainable development, which determines the importance of their classification. Based on a comparison of European and national experience, it has been determined that the formation of a national strategy for sustainable development in Ukraine needs to strengthen the institutional capacity to finance activities and objectives in this area. Originality / scientific novelty. The system of criterions for the development of standards, regulators, international organizations, which forms the institutional support for the financing of sustainable development based on the multistakeholder approach, has been developed. Practical value / implications. The specified system of criterions allows to streamline the process of defining a conceptual framework for financing sustainable development initiatives, taking into account the institutional and regulatory environment and the prevailing interests of stakeholders