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The purpose of this study is to investigate the voluntary disclosure of accounting ratios in the corporate annual reports of manufacturing firms in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and determines whether an association exists between voluntary disclosure and firm-specific characteristics namely, size, profitability, leverage, liquidity and efficiency.

A sample of 53 GCC listed manufacturing firms and 263 firm-year observations were observed over the period 2011 to 2015. A count data regression (Poisson) with incident rate ratios was used to identify the relationship between firms’ voluntary disclosures of accounting ratios and other firm-specific characteristics.

During the period under review, the voluntary disclosure of accounting ratios provided in annual reports of GCC firms were found to be exceedingly low. On average, a GCC company discloses at most two accounting ratios in its annual reports. The results also show that the profitability ratios are the most popularly reported ones. Controlling for family board domination, the results also reveal that structure-related variables (firm size and leverage) are positively associated with accounting ratio disclosures. However, performance-related variables (profitability, liquidity and efficiency) have no significant effect on disclosures. The authors conclude that signaling theory as implied in the performance-related variables is not strongly supported in the GCC region.

This is the first known study to investigate the disclosure of accounting ratios and its determinants within the context of GCC. The findings of this study could be beneficial to both agents and principals in assessing the associated risks. The study provides regulators and market participants an understanding of the corporate reporting activities of manufacturing firms in the GCC and who accordingly will be able to consider associated policy implementation.

This paper aims to verify whether the integration of sustainability in executive compensation positively affects firms’ non-financial performance and whether corporate governance characteristics enhance the relationship between sustainability compensation and firms’ non-financial performance and to expand the domain of the impact of sustainability on non-financial performance.

This analysis is based on a sample of companies listed on the Milan Italian Stock Exchange from the Financial Times Milan Stock Exchange Index over the 2016–2020 period. Regression analysis was used by using data retrieved from the Refinitiv Eikon database and the sample firms’ remuneration reports.

The findings of this paper show that embedding sustainability in executive compensation positively affects firms’ non-financial performance. The results of this paper also reveal that specific corporate governance features can improve the impact of sustainability on non-financial performance.

This analysis is limited to Italian firms included in the Financial Times Milan Stock Exchange Index; however, the findings are highly significant.

The findings provide regulators with useful insights for considering the integration of sustainability goals into executive remuneration. Another implication is that policymakers should require – at least – listed firms to fulfil specific corporate governance structural requirements. Finally, the findings can provide investors and financial analysts with a greater awareness of the role played by executive remuneration in the long-term value-creation process.

This paper contributes to addressing the relationship among sustainability, remuneration and non-financial disclosure, drawing on the stakeholder–agency theoretical framework and focusing on Italian firms. This issue has received limited attention with controversial results in the literature.