Whether corporate green bonds act as armour during crises? Evidence from a natural experiment

Purpose The present study examines the rationale behind the increased global presence of corporate green bonds as a green financing tool to facilitate sustainable practices and eco-friendly investing. The authors investigate the intriguing question of whether the companies that issue green bonds are valued more by investors or not, and further extend our analysis by exploring whether the green image of companies helps to minimize the value erosion during a crisis and enhance the resilience of the stocks? Design/methodology/approach To examine the association between environmental commitments and firm value, the authors use the COVID-19 crisis as an exogenous shock and create a perfect natural setting to eliminate the endogeneity bias from our estimations. Moreover, the authors use propensity score matching to choose a one-to-one match of green bond firms with a larger pool of brown bond firms and eliminate the “size effect” arising out of the disproportionate sample size of green and brown bond firms. Findings The results of the study indicate that green bond firms are valued more by investors compared to brown bonds firms. Hence, green bond issuance acts as a strong signal of a firm's environmental commitment and it is well recognized by the investors. One of the possible reasons for a higher value of green bond firms may be due to their ability to arrest value erosion during environmental shocks. The authors could not find any difference in the resilience of green and brown bond firms. Originality/value The study contributes to the growing literature in the area of impact investing, specifically on exponentially growing innovative instrument green bond. Our study integrates two areas of research, i.e. corporate finance and impact investing by examining the impact of green bond issuance on firm value and stock market returns. The results would help environmentally sensitive investors to devise their investment portfolios more efficiently.