Abstract

This study explores the effect of information-based environmental regulation, which requires companies to record and publicly report their pollutant emissions, on companies’ financial outcomes, e.g., profits. Specifically, the study derives theoretically hypotheses specific to information-based regulation, drawing upon standard economic theory, which posits that any environmental regulation undermines financial outcomes, and the Porter Theory, which posits that environmental regulation may improve financial outcomes. The study then tests empirically these hypotheses in the context of European Pollutant Release and Transfer Register (E-PRTR) regulation using data on German manufacturing facilities, which are available from the Mannheim Innovation Panel (MIP) database.