Carbon disclosure and the cost of capital*
File(s)
Published online version
Author(s)
Bolton, Patrick
Kacperczyk, Marcin
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
We link voluntary and mandatory disclosure of carbon emissions with stock returns and volatility in a global cross-section of publicly listed firms. We find that voluntary disclosure of scope 1 emissions predicts lower stock returns relative to non-disclosing companies. We also find that UK mandatory carbon disclosure rules for publicly traded companies resulted in lower stock-level uncertainty. The effect of these mandatory disclosure rules also spilled over into other markets, especially those with close geographic and economic proximity, and companies in the same industry.
Date Issued
2026-06-23
Date Acceptance
2026-03-04
Citation
European Accounting Review, 2026
ISSN
0963-8180
Publisher
Taylor and Francis Group
Journal / Book Title
European Accounting Review
Copyright Statement
© 2026 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. The terms on which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.
License URL
Publication Status
Published online
Date Publish Online
2026-06-23