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Market Effects of Voluntary Climate Action by Firms: Evidence from the Chicago Climate Exchange

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  • Will Gans
  • Beat Hintermann

Abstract

Are private voluntary environmental actions by firms a sign of mismanagement, or a profitable “win-win” replacement for regulation? Empirical evidence is decidedly mixed. In this study, we use 19 years of monthly stock price returns, from 1991 to 2009, to examine the profitability of participation in CCX, a large voluntary greenhouse gas mitigation program. After controlling for systemic market risk as well as industry-specific shocks, we find statistically significant and positive excess returns for firms that announce their decision to join CCX. In addition, the progress of proposed greenhouse gas legislation (the Waxman–Markey bill) had a positive and large impact on excess returns for CCX member firms, suggesting that a major incentive for firms to join CCX may be to prepare for future regulation. Marginal abatement costs (proxied by the carbon price), on the other hand, were unrelated to excess returns. Our results imply that voluntary approaches should play a role in combating climate change, but that relying on them alone is not enough. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013

Suggested Citation

  • Will Gans & Beat Hintermann, 2013. "Market Effects of Voluntary Climate Action by Firms: Evidence from the Chicago Climate Exchange," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 55(2), pages 291-308, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:enreec:v:55:y:2013:i:2:p:291-308
    DOI: 10.1007/s10640-012-9626-7
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    Cited by:

    1. Hjort, Ingrid, 2016. "Potential Climate Risks in Financial Markets: A Literature Overview," Memorandum 01/2016, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    2. Dragan Ilic & Janick Christian Mollet, 2016. "Voluntary Corporate Climate Initiatives and Regulatory Loom: Batten Down the Hatches," CER-ETH Economics working paper series 16/261, CER-ETH - Center of Economic Research (CER-ETH) at ETH Zurich.
    3. Lin, Boqiang & Jia, Zhijie, 2017. "The impact of Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) and the choice of coverage industry in ETS: A case study in China," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 205(C), pages 1512-1527.
    4. William Nordhaus, 2014. "The Ethics of Efficient Markets and Commons Tragedies: A Review of John Broome's Climate Matters: Ethics in a Warming World," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 52(4), pages 1135-1141, December.
    5. Lin, Boqiang & Jia, Zhijie, 2020. "Does the different sectoral coverage matter? An analysis of China's carbon trading market," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    6. Lily Hsueh, 2019. "Opening up the firm: What explains participation and effort in voluntary carbon disclosure by global businesses? An analysis of internal firm factors and dynamics," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(7), pages 1302-1322, November.
    7. Tolu Olarewaju & Samir Dani & Collins Obeng-Fosu & Tayo Olarewaju & Abdul Jabbar, 2024. "The Impact of Climate Action on the Financial Performance of Food, Grocery, and Supermarket Retailers in the UK," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(5), pages 1-23, February.
    8. Beat Hintermann & Maja Žarković, 2021. "A carbon horse race: abatement subsidies vs. permit trading in Switzerland," Climate Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(3), pages 290-306, March.
    9. Ili, Dragan & Mollet, Janick Christian, 2015. "Voluntary Corporate Climate Initiatives and Regulatory Loom: Batten Down the Hatches," Working papers 2015/06, Faculty of Business and Economics - University of Basel.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Voluntary action; Firm performance; Climate change ; Permit markets; Corporate social responsibility;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q53 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Air Pollution; Water Pollution; Noise; Hazardous Waste; Solid Waste; Recycling
    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming

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