Abstract:Environmental and social disclosures entail costs, yet increasingly, large listed firms are making higher and better quality disclosures. In this paper we examine the link between a firm's environmental and social disclosures and its profitability and market value. We find that past profitability drives current social disclosures. However, consistent with the existing evidence, we do not find any relation between environmental disclosures and profitability. Further, while prior literature has largely focussed on environmental disclosure, we find that it is the social disclosures that matter to investors. We find that firms that make higher social disclosures have higher market values. Further analysis reveals that this link is driven by higher expected growth rates in the cash flows of such companies. Overall our findings are consistent with the resource based view of the firm and the voluntary disclosure theory, suggesting that firms with greater economic resources make more extensive disclosures which yield net positive economic benefits.

In this paper we draw on insights from theories in the management and corporate governance literature to develop a theoretical model that makes explicit the links between a firm's corporate social responsibility (CSR) related board attributes, its board CSR strategy, and its environmental and social performance. We then test the model using structural equation modeling approach.We find that the greater the CSR orientation of the board (as measured by the board's independence, gender diversity, and financial expertise on audit committee), the more proactive and comprehensive the firm's CSR strategy, and the higher its environmental and social performance. Moreover, we find this link to be endogenous and self-reinforcing, with superior CSR performers tending to further strengthen their board CSR orientation.This result while positive is also suggestive of the widening of the gap between the leads and laggards in CSR.Therefore the question arises as to how 'leaders' are using their superior CSR competencies seen by many scholars as a source of corporate (at times unfair) competitive advantage. Stakeholders of corporations therefore need to be cognizant of this aspect of CSR when evaluating a firm's CSR activities. Policy makers also need to be cognizant of these concerns when designing regulation in this field.

We examine the link between a firm's environmental (E) and social (S) disclosures and measures of its risk including total, systematic, and idiosyncratic risk. While we do not find any link between a firm's E and S disclosures and its systematic risk, we find a negative and significant association between these disclosures and a firm's total and idiosyncratic risk. These are novel findings and are consistent with the predictions of the stakeholder theory and the resource based view of the firm suggesting that firms which make extensive and objective E and S disclosures promote corporate transparency that can help them build a positive reputation and trust with its stakeholders, which in turn can help mitigate the firm's idiosyncratic/operational risk. These findings are important for all corporate stakeholders including managers, employees, and suppliers who have a significant economic interest in the survival and success of the firm.

Several ligands were designed to promote transition-metal-free cross-coupling reactions of aryl halides with benzene derivatives. Among the systems probed, quinoline-1-amino-2-carboxylic acid was found to serve as an excellent catalyst for cross-coupling between aryl halides and unactivated benzene. Reactions using this inexpensive catalytic system displayed a high functional group tolerance as well as excellent chemoselectivities.