Financial constraints and corporate greenwashing strategies in China

Abstract Corporate environmental responsibility, in response to the call for sustainable development, has become a critical ethical capital for companies to increase firm values and to obtain resources. However, this also gives rise to the concern of “greenwashing” that companies may selectively release environmental performance information to mislead the public and investors. Using the administrative environmental penalty data of all listed companies in China from 2017 to 2018, this research examines the corporate's greenwashing strategies. Our results show that greenwashing by listed companies in China is widespread, that only 13.6% environmental penalties have been disclosed by companies during our studied…