Corporate negative sentiments and the environment during a pandemic: evidence from quarterly earnings conference calls Online publication date: Mon, 22-Aug-2022
by Jorge A. Romero
Interdisciplinary Environmental Review (IER), Vol. 22, No. 2, 2022
Abstract: Motivated by the rising number of COVID-19 cases that were reported around December 2019, firms started to show concerns about the adverse effects on their business operations. This study uses a COVID-19 variable of negative sentiments that is a text-based measure of the sentiment associated with the spread of COVID-19 that the US publicly traded firms disclose in their quarterly earnings conference calls. This study provides novel data and the first empirical evidence on the extent to which the COVID-19 negative sentiments disclosed by firms are positively correlated with a reduction in CO2 emissions. This study provides new insights and looks into the positive aspect of this pandemic, a greener environment due to a reduction in CO2. Results show that firms' concerns in their quarterly earnings conference calls are negatively correlated with CO2 emissions, fuel consumption, real gross domestic product and the US manufacturing production index.
Existing subscribers:
Go to Inderscience Online Journals to access the Full Text of this article.
If you are not a subscriber and you just want to read the full contents of this article, buy online access here.Complimentary Subscribers, Editors or Members of the Editorial Board of the Interdisciplinary Environmental Review (IER):
Login with your Inderscience username and password:
Want to subscribe?
A subscription gives you complete access to all articles in the current issue, as well as to all articles in the previous three years (where applicable). See our Orders page to subscribe.
If you still need assistance, please email subs@inderscience.com
Our Blog 
Follow us on Twitter 
Visit us on Facebook