Yu Haixu, Liang Chuanyu, Wang Weiran, Liu Xinglin
School of Economics, Shenzhen Polytechnic University, Shenzhen, China.
Department of Finance, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen, China.
Front Public Health. 2025 Apr 11;13:1509167. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1509167. eCollection 2025.
Amid growing global environmental challenges and the pursuit of sustainable development, Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) has become an important framework for promoting green and responsible business practices. This paper investigates how ESG-related media coverage affects the cost of equity, with a focus on how improved information transparency can influence firms' financing outcomes.
We construct an ESG performance index using a machine learning approach, based on ESG-related news text data and the level of media attention received by listed companies. The index is calculated by evaluating the tone (positive or negative) of each firm's annual ESG news coverage.
The results reveal a significant negative correlation between corporate ESG media coverage and the cost of equity, where more positive coverage is associated with a lower financing cost. Mechanism analysis confirms that stronger ESG performance can reduce equity costs by enhancing the transparency of corporate information. Heterogeneity analysis further shows that this negative relationship is more pronounced in state-owned and large firms.
The findings provide empirical evidence for the relationship between ESG news coverage and the cost of equity, validating this link in the context of an emerging market. These results offer new insights into how ESG engagement improves capital market efficiency and supports the broader goals of sustainable and responsible investment.
在全球环境挑战日益严峻以及对可持续发展的追求中，环境、社会和治理（ESG）已成为促进绿色和负责任商业实践的重要框架。本文研究与ESG相关的媒体报道如何影响股权成本，重点关注信息透明度的提高如何影响公司的融资结果。
我们基于与ESG相关的新闻文本数据和上市公司获得的媒体关注程度，采用机器学习方法构建了一个ESG绩效指数。该指数通过评估每家公司年度ESG新闻报道的基调（正面或负面）来计算。
结果显示企业ESG媒体报道与股权成本之间存在显著的负相关关系，即更多的正面报道与更低的融资成本相关。机制分析证实，更强的ESG绩效可以通过提高公司信息透明度来降低股权成本。异质性分析进一步表明，这种负相关关系在国有企业和大型企业中更为明显。
研究结果为ESG新闻报道与股权成本之间的关系提供了实证证据，在新兴市场背景下验证了这种联系。这些结果为ESG参与如何提高资本市场效率以及支持可持续和负责任投资的更广泛目标提供了新的见解。
