Women in the boardroom and their impact on default risk: a pitch

Abstract

This pitch research letter (PRL) applies the pitching template developed by Faff (2015) to an academic project on boardroom gender diversity and default risk. The pitching template helped the pitcher to identify the core elements that form the framework of the research project. The PRL encloses a brief background about the pitcher and pitch, followed by a brief commentary on the pitch and personal reflections of the pitcher on the pitch exercise itself.

Environmental, social and governance disclosure and default risk

“…First, we contribute to the stream of research that explores the determinants of firms' default risk. This recent strand of literature has identified important determinants of default risk: for example, stock market liquidity (Brogaard et al, 2017; Nadarajah et al, 2020), incentive structure (Bennett et al, 2015), innovation performance (Hsu et al, 2015), debt maturity choice (Goyal & Wang, 2013), stock market return and volatility (Giesecke et al, 2011) and corporate governance characteristics including CEO compensation, board independence, gender diversity and ownership structure (see, e.g., Acrey et al, 2011; Ali, 2017; Ali et al, 2018, 2021; Chiang et al, 2015; Chiu & Wagner, 2012; Kabir et al, 2020; Miglani et al, 2015; Nadaraja et al, 2020; Schultz et al, 2017; Switzer & Wang, 2013; Vallascas & Hagendorff, 2013). We extend this literature by providing robust evidence regarding the role of aggregate ESG disclosure as a critical determinant of default risk for US nonfinancial firms.…”