Análise da relação entre disclosure na internet, risco e retorno em companhias latino-americanas.

Abstract

This study sought to examine the extent to which the internet is used as a tool for the dissemination of corporate information, facilitating the transparency of companies in relation to their stakeholders. To quantify the quality of disclosure on the internet of the companies listed on the four major exchanges in Latin America (Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Mexico) it was used an index elaborated and tested by Garay et al. (2013) also in Latin America. The sample included 758 companies that had their level of disclosure quantified and verified the possible relations with the risk and return through estimates by Tobit method, model indicated to provide more robustness to estimates when the dependent variable is censored. In the results, it is noticed, from the descriptive analysis and the comparison with previous studies that the disclosure in the region has advanced over the years, but unevenly between the countries, with Brazil stood out positively in the region. Additionally, it can be seen that the expected negative and significant relationship between disclosure and proxies for the risk can only be observed between companies with ADRs and thus comply with additional disclosure standards required by those markets. The positive and significant relationship between the ICDI and proxies for return were observed only among the companies with greater liquidity in the trading of its shares. As regards the differences between countries statistical estimations suggest that there is no significant differences between them that could cause an impact in the relations with the risk and return of companies. Thus, it is possible to highlight that the main contributions of this study are related to the method, since most studies use the Ordinary Least Square which has limitations when the dependent variable is censored; and the estimations results that indicate not only to investors but also to regulators which are effectively the effect of the expansion of disclosure promoted over the years in the risk and return of Latin- American companies.