Climate-related Disclosure Commitment of the Lenders, Credit Rationing, and Borrower Environmental Performance
Using lenders becoming members of the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) as a plausible exogeneous shock, we examine whether and how lenders’ commitment to transparent climate-related disclosures affects borrower firms’ environmental performance. We find that client firms of TCFD-member lenders, relative to control firms, significantly improve their environmental performance after the TCFD launch. The effects are stronger for polluting firms. Moreover, TCFD-member lenders influence their borrowers’ environmental performance via charging higher loan spread and reducing the number and amount of new loans issued to polluting firms. Finally, polluting clients of TCFD-member lenders experience tightened financial constraints subsequently.
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- Published on 02/21/2024
- FR
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Updated on: 02/21/2024 14:31