Corporate Social Responsibility and Insider Trading: Evidence from China

Abstract

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is the obligation of a company to pursue long-term goals, and is an important part of a sustainable society. It is related not only to the survival and sustainable development of the company, but also to the expectations of the public. CSR is an important way for companies to disclose non-financial information. Information disclosure can alleviate information asymmetry effectively, improve the quality of internal control, and affect the occurrence of insider trading. However, the existing research has paid less attention to the impact of non-financial information on CSR and insider trading, as well as the impact of the corporate nature and disclosure motivation on this relationship. This paper takes China’s 2011–2016 Shanghai and Shenzhen A-share listed companies as a sample to study the relationship between CSR and insider trading. The results show the following. (1) CSR and insider trading have a significant negative correlation. (2) From the perspective of the nature of the enterprise, the CSR of non-state-owned enterprises can significantly suppress the occurrence of insider trading, while the relationship is not significant for state-owned enterprises. (3) From the perspective of disclosure motivation, voluntary disclosure can significantly suppress the occurrence of insider trading. However, mandatory disclosure and semi-mandatory disclosure are not significant. The research in this paper is of great significance to encourage enterprises to fulfill their social responsibilities and improve the supervision of illegal insider trading.