This study explores the influence of climate risk on properties of firms’ financial reporting practices with observations collected from 64 countries between 2005 and 2016. We use a country-level climate risk indicator developed by Germanwatch to measure the degree of damage from extreme weather events, and find that climate risk positively influences firms’ engagements in both accruals-based and real earnings management. Furthermore, we document that the above-mentioned effects of climate risk are moderated by the quality of country-level public governance. Subsample analysis suggests that the main effect of climate risk on earnings management is more pronounced for firms from developed countries, for firms in environment-sensitive industries, and for firms reporting losses. Our findings, which are supported by a battery of robustness tests, have important implication for regulators and policymakers.

这项研究通过2005年至2016年间从64个国家/地区收集的观察数据，探讨了气候风险对公司财务报告行为的影响。我们使用由Germanwatch开发的国家/地区级气候风险指标来衡量极端天气事件造成的损害程度，并发现气候风险对应计制和实际盈余管理产生了积极的影响。此外，我们证明，国家级公共治理的质量减轻了上述气候风险的影响。子样本分析表明，气候风险对盈余管理的主要影响对于发达国家的公司，对环境敏感的行业的公司以及报告亏损的公司更为明显。我们的发现得到了一系列健壮性测试的支持，