The Effect of Corporate Social Responsibility Activities on Investors’ Heterogeneous Beliefs: A Study of Korea’s Data Set

Abstract

This study analyzes the effect of corporate social responsibility (CSR) activity on investors' heterogeneous beliefs. The hypothesis of this study is based on the conflicting effects of CSR activities on firm value and earning's quality. Investors' heterogeneous beliefs used in the empirical analysis of this study are trading volume, and CSR activity is measured by the KEJI Index (Korea Economic Justice Institute Index). This study performs an empirical analysis using regression analysis including control variables. CSR activities are found to have a positive relationship with trading volume. This is consistent regardless of the low and high accounting information (earning's quality). It can be interpreted that Korea's CSR activity acts as an incentive to increase investors' heterogeneous beliefs about target companies. In other words, it implies that the investor judges CSR activities negatively when evaluating firm value. This study could have a policy implication in that it analyzes how CSR activities affect investors' decision-making. In other words, this study analyzed CSR activities from the perspective of shareholders. Therefore, this study is expected to provide useful information for policymaking by regulatory agencies. In particular, its contribution is to presents data that CSR activities can be a negative factor in evaluating firm values.