Philippines Publicly Listed Property Companies’ Potential for Greenwashing and Earnings Management and the Moderating Effect of Profitability: Evidence from Published Sustainability and Financial Reports

Mary May Eulogio; Mary Antoinette Manzal; Kevin Navarrete; Camille Grace Negrillo; Audrey Faye Ordoyo; Jonvic Victoria

doi:10.58905/athena.v4i4.819

Authors

Mary May Eulogio Department of Accountancy, College of Business Administration and Accountancy, De La Salle University–Dasmariñas, Dasmariñas City, Philippines
Mary Antoinette Manzal Department of Accountancy, College of Business Administration and Accountancy, De La Salle University–Dasmariñas, Dasmariñas City, Philippines https://orcid.org/0009-0004-0333-1355
Kevin Navarrete Department of Accountancy, College of Business Administration and Accountancy, De La Salle University–Dasmariñas, Dasmariñas City, Philippines https://orcid.org/0009-0001-3108-0782
Camille Grace Negrillo Department of Accountancy, College of Business Administration and Accountancy, De La Salle University–Dasmariñas, Dasmariñas City, Philippines https://orcid.org/0009-0003-1037-4145
Audrey Faye Ordoyo Department of Accountancy, College of Business Administration and Accountancy, De La Salle University–Dasmariñas, Dasmariñas City, Philippines
Jonvic Victoria Department of Accountancy, College of Business Administration and Accountancy, De La Salle University–Dasmariñas, Dasmariñas City, Philippines https://orcid.org/0009-0000-1484-945X

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.58905/athena.v4i4.819

Keywords:

Greenwashing, earnings management, sustainability disclosure, property companies, panel regression

Abstract

This study examined a disclosure-based proxy for potential greenwashing and its association with accrual-based earnings management among 40 publicly listed Philippine property firms during 2022–2024, comprising 120 firm-year observations. A 35-item environmental disclosure index classified information as absent, symbolic, or substantive. The gap between overall and substantive-scored disclosure equals the number of symbolic items divided by 70. Coding used a shared handbook and author cross-review, but inter-rater reliability was not quantified. Discretionary accruals were estimated using the Modified Jones Model. The main random-effects model used firm-level pairs-bootstrap uncertainty and wild-bootstrap p-values. The mean gap was .1171. Signed mean discretionary accruals were .0239, −.0020, and .0057 across 2022–2024. Neither the disclosure coefficient (b = −.0235, p = .933) nor the profitability interaction (b = 8.044, p = .135) was statistically significant; reported R² was .228. Year indicators and lagged ROA did not support the hypotheses. Some exploratory outlier treatments yielded significant interactions, indicating specification sensitivity. Results concern symbolic disclosure and model-unexplained accruals; they neither validate the score as a measure of environmental misrepresentation nor establish the absence of a relationship between actual greenwashing and earnings management.

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