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This study aims to investigate the role of negative media coverage of environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues in deterring tax avoidance. Inspired by media agenda-setting theory and legitimacy theory, this study hypothesises that an increase in ESG negative media coverage should cause a reputational drawback, leading companies to reduce tax avoidance to regain their legitimacy. Hence, this study examines a novel channel that links ESG and taxation.

This study uses panel regression analysis to examine the relationship between negative media coverage of ESG issues and tax avoidance among the largest European entities. This study considers different measures of tax avoidance and negative media coverage.

The results show that negative media coverage of ESG issues is negatively associated with tax avoidance, suggesting that media can act as an external monitor for corporate taxation.

The findings have implications for policymakers and regulators, which should consider tax transparency when dealing with ESG disclosure requirements. Tax disclosure should be integrated into ESG reporting.

The study has social implications related to the media, which act as watchdogs for firms’ irresponsible practices. According to this study’s findings, increased media pressure has the power to induce a better alignment between declared ESG policies and tax strategies.

This study contributes to the literature on the mechanisms that discourage tax avoidance and the literature on the relationship between ESG and taxation by shedding light on the role of media coverage.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between tax losses and the likelihood of emerging from bankruptcy procedures as reorganized entities, exploiting the exogenous shock provided by the 1997 Taxpayer Relief Act (TRA) in the USA.

The empirical analysis uses a difference-in-differences approach and investigates a sample of US public firms filing under Chapter 11 bankruptcy procedures during the period 1984–2016. The analysis includes several robustness and endogeneity tests, including heterogeneous treatment effect analysis, entropy balancing and propensity score matching.

The findings show that filing firms with higher tax losses are more likely to emerge from the procedure as reorganized firms. Further, this paper shows that firms with high tax losses reduced their likelihood of reorganization after the enactment of the 1997 TRA, as the new regulation reduced tax benefits related to losses. Additional analyses show that tax losses contribute to the reorganization of filing firms requiring more cash resources and restructuring efforts and they increase post-bankruptcy creditors’ recovery rates.

This study informs policymakers, shareholders, creditors and other stakeholders that tax policy can facilitate business continuity within restructuring frameworks and preserve economic and social value.

This study contributes to the literature on taxation and corporate restructuring with evidence that tax-loss policies incentivize reorganization during bankruptcy procedures. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to empirically demonstrate that tax losses influence the form of exit from bankruptcy procedures, adding to the set of firms’ features affecting bankruptcy emergence.

This study aims to examine the impact of ESG performance on financial risk (FR) in energy firms from developing countries. It also explores the moderating roles of ESG controversies and board gender diversity (BGD) on this relationship.

The research uses a panel data set of 218 energy firms from 20 developing countries from 2019 to 2024, using two-stage least squares regression to address potential endogeneity. Robustness checks are conducted using fixed-effects estimation and pooled ordinary least squares.

The results indicate that superior ESG performance significantly reduces both total and systemic risk. ESG controversies positively moderate the relationship between ESG performance and FR, suggesting that controversies may weaken the risk-reducing benefits of strong ESG practices. Additionally, BGD significantly strengthens the negative relationship between ESG performance and FR. Robustness checks confirm the consistency of these findings across different estimation methods.

This study contributes to the growing body of literature by examining the role of ESG performance in FR mitigation, specifically within the energy sector in developing countries. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first research to explore these dynamics in this specific context. This study uniquely illustrates how ESG controversies and BGD significantly moderate the ESG–risk relationship, offering fresh insights that extend stakeholder, risk management and legitimacy theories. The findings highlight the importance of integrating ESG factors into corporate governance and risk management, particularly for firms operating in high-risk, high-impact industries such as energy.