The Moderating Role of Financial Constraints in the Influence of Environmental Sustainability Reporting on the Stock Returns of Firms Listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange

Stock return demonstrates the efficiency of a firm in creating net interests for the shareholders in return for their investment in firm stocks and is influenced by various factors. The present study seeks to investigate the impact of Social Performance Reporting on stock returns considering the moderating role of financial constraints. The present study used data from firms listed in Tehran Stock Exchange selected through purposive sampling over 2012-2019. The present study is applied in terms of the research objective, and multiple regression has been used for data analysis. The Kaplan and Zingales (1997) model has been used to estimate financial constraints in this study, given the current practice in previous domestic and foreign research. Results indicated that Social Performance Reporting had a significant and positive influence on the stock returns of firms listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange. Besides, results demonstrated that financial constraint played a negative moderating role in the relationship between Social Performance Reporting and the stock returns of firms listed in the Tehran Stock Exchange.