Research#

Working Papers#

"Real Effects of Aggregate Environmental Information: Evidence from Emission Reduction Investments" Job Market Paper, 2025.
Draft availabe upon request.
Summary

I study how firms adjust their own environmental investments in response to the disclosure of aggregate peer data in statistical reports. My analyses are based on proprietary data covering about 8,000 German firms from 2006 to 2014, exploiting a disclosure change in 2009 that affected one investment type. I find that, following the disclosure change, firms increase their emission reduction investments by 24% relative to the other six environmental investment types whose aggregate disclosure remains unchanged. This net increase masks shifts in firm behavior: firms that had previously invested below (above) the industry average tend to increase (decrease) their investments suggesting that firms view the industry average as a better-informed peer benchmark. At the same time, a complementary survey experiment indicates that substantial information processing costs limit the efficient use of statistical reports, highlighting an important friction in the integration of aggregate disclosures into firm-level decisions.

"Stock Market Reaction to Product-Level Carbon Estimates" with Thomas Bourveau & Clemens Lauer, 2025, R&R at Communications Earth & Environment (Nature Portfolio).
SSRN
Summary

We leverage the sudden introduction of salient flight-level carbon estimates provided by Google Flights. Using an event-study research design, we document an initial market reaction, with airline market values declining by around 2% following the release of the granular information. The decrease in market value is more pronounced for airlines with older fleets and is muted for airlines in China where Google Flights is not available. We interpret these findings as evidence that the equity market responds to changes in expected demand once consumers receive context-specific information about their carbon footprint. From a policy perspective, our findings indicate that the relevant level of information disaggregation differs among stakeholders. Further, they suggest that presenting information within a decision-making context to consumers is important for investors to price consumers' expected preferences.

"Relative Importance of Financial and Environmental Information in B2B Contracting: Experimental Evidence from Firms in Germany" with Jannis Bischof, Yuhan Liu, & Davud Rostam-Afschar, 2025.
Draft will follow.
Summary

We examine the relative importance of financial and environmental information in supply chain contracting decisions. Unlike prior studies that analyze these aspects separately, we integrate them using a discrete choice experiment (DCE). Surveying 3,172 firm representatives in Germany, we find that financial characteristics are 4.7 times more influential than environmental characteristics when selecting a business partner. Perhaps surprisingly, firms prefer environmental disclosure over non-disclosure, even when environmental performance is weak. This aligns with ambiguity aversion, suggesting that firms penalize a lack of environmental transparency (which introduces uncertainty) more than poor environmental performance itself. Further cross-sectional analyses reveal that for firms actively engaged in sustainability, strong environmental performance partly offsets the negative impact of weak financial performance on selection likelihood, consistent with an environmental insurance effect. In contrast, firms facing regulatory pressure prioritize financial strength without compromise.