Corporate governance: information disclosure level and its relation with the stock price volatility on Ibovespa

Abstract

This empirical-analytical study investigates the role of accounting as a source of information to the Brazilian capital market. It aims to verify whether the accounting disclosure level provided by Brazilian entities is related to the volatility of their share prices on Bovespa (Brazilian Stock Exchange). Entities with greater accounting disclosure level are expected to present lower volatility of their stock returns. To analyze the relation between disclosure level and stock price volatility, we collected information published by 42 companies listed on Ibovespa, using the annual reports for 2002. After segregating these companies into three different groups in accordance with their specific disclosure level, using cluster analysis, we statistically verified the existence or not of significant differences between their disclosure and stock price volatility levels. The analyses indicated that the companies with better average accounting disclosure presented lower mean volatility levels, while the cluster with worse average disclosure presented higher mean volatility levels. This evidences that higher average disclosure levels result in lower mean volatility of stock returns.